Cry Your Name
by ink and ashes
Summary: 'The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep... and miles to go before I sleep.' A somewhat alternate ending to Cry Your Name and the revelations that come in coping with the death of Alexander Whitman
1. The First

_Cry Your Name_

**THE FIRST**

It was a surprise that she had yet to spot him.

She was pacing, frantically categorizing glossy photographs as she circled the little table they were piled on. She would stop in her tracks every so often and tremble, her enormous brown eyes staring into space. It would seem odd to a random passerby, almost as odd as the Crash Down closing several hours before its normal time—courtesy of Jeff Parker in respect to the Whitman family, since he had not been able to attend the viewing or burial due to circumstances involving a delayed supplier—but he was no random onlooker and he stood before the locked door for several moments, silent and soaked to the bone. When she crumbled onto the floor, inadvertently scattering the photographs she had been sorting through only moments before, it was hard to remember that this was Elizabeth Parker. _Liz_, the painfully logical, clinically detached _Liz Parker_ that had brazenly declared Alex's passing as foul play. By an _alien._

He'd been _pissed_, to put it mildly. Everything Liz had done, from that photograph to her bitter accusation in Alex's room, seemed to upset everyone even more than the occasion warranted. Max was furious with her, ranting and raving at how coldly and callously his former flame had handled the situation with Isabel not too far behind… when she was not crying hopelessly in her room. Tess and the Valenti men were holed up in their home, quietly lamenting, and Maria had run out of tears to shed. Adding Liz and her fierce investigation into the picture had separated the group by their respective species, fueling the fire on emotions already scrubbed raw.

Michael had been determined to give Liz a piece of his mind, consequences be damned. She had not shed a tear when Max stiffly walked away from the van holding Alex's cold corpse, had not expressed her grief during the funeral. She had upset Maria by showing her the photograph she'd found in the wrecked car, coldly stating her thoughts without any regard to anyone else. She was a fucking _robot_ and it sickened him that someone who had been a _supposed_ friend could so easily continue this fruitless search without emotion. She was stirring up dark shadows in their already deteriorating group, first by betraying Max with Kyle—something he _still_ could not wrap his head around—and now this bullshit. She had been so helpful once, eagerly contributing in their ceaseless quest to discover themselves and their purpose, but now all she did was make waves and that was the last thing they needed. This shit stopped _now_, he swore as he stalked towards her home.

She was screaming now, the panes of glass unable to contain her sorrow. He'd always known she was small, but just then she seemed impossibly tiny sitting there, rocking back and forth with her eyes closed. Her arms were clenched around her abdomen as if she would tear at the seams if she did not hold herself together. His chest constricted at the sight of her falling apart, a hollow ache forcing him to swallow painfully past the lump in his esophagus. He felt like an ass.

_Fuck._ How could he have forgotten?

Before she had ever dated Kyle, before Max had fallen in love with her during the third grade, before Max, Isabel and he had ever _hatched_, Elizabeth Parker had known Alexander Whitman. They, along with one Maria DeLuca, had formed a triangle of unconditional friendship, of unwavering platonic love. Inseparable. Michael raised one hand to the cold, wet glass door before him, trying to put himself into her shoes; if Max or Isabel had died in circumstances that may have seemed ordinary—or worse, labeled as a _suicide_—he would have… damn it, he would have done the same fucking thing she had. She was going with her gut instincts, doing everything in her power to understand exactly what had lead to the death of someone she had loved so much, it had physically hurt her to lie to him when Liz had been determined to keep the secret about the extraterrestrials.

It made him want to laugh in a sad, depreciating way. He, Michael Guerin, was pissed at Liz because she was acting like _him_. He was pissed because he now knew what it felt like to be on the sidelines, watching someone else stampede through their decisions and follow their determined course of action without a thought as to how it may affect other people. He was pissed because he could no longer _be_ pissed at her, now that he understood.

When all was said and done, when all that was left was the aching emptiness and the need to howl at the universe for the shitty hand it gave you, it had to be done _alone_.

Never, not in all his years wandering this damned town, did he think he would have something so painfully in common with Liz Parker.

Lost in his contemplation of the small slip of a girl on the other side of the window, he did not notice the young man standing beside him at first. The boy was lanky and pale, huddling in a jacket already soaked from the incessant downpour. Michael retrieved his hand from its perch on the glass, glaring down at the young male in silent inquiry, inexplicably annoyed with him for having the gall to stand there and shamelessly watch Liz as she clawed at herself in hysteria. This was a _private _moment, not to be witnessed by some moron he did not know. Of course, one could have said the same of Michael, but the situation was entirely different where he was concerned, he believed. _He_ could watch Liz shatter into infinitesimal pieces all over the restaurant's floor, not this scrawny kid.

"She looks pretty bad," the boy commented awkwardly, reaching into his pocket.

"She does," Michael agreed, his glare hardening. "What do you want?"

The boy blanched at the blunt, thinly veiled hostility. He stammered. "I, uh… she told me to tell her if, um… anything _weird_ came up." He pulled two long, thin pieces of paper from his denim pants, handing it to him uncertainly. "I delivered that Whitman guy some food and she…" the kid trailed off, clearing his throat. "Uh, anyway, this is the receipt," he continued to explain. "The company declined it 'cause of the way he signed it."

Michael frowned at the piece of carbon paper, the dark blue imprint of the decidedly odd signature unsettling him. They had always bantered with Alex about his affinity with computers, but to sign his name in binary—if, indeed, it _was_ his name—seemed downright bizarre, even for someone as technologically enlightened as Alex had been. Forcing the bile in his stomach to quell, he stuffed the potential evidence in his own pocket—not that he agreed with Parker, but it was definitely something to contemplate—and motioned for the boy to leave with a terse nod. Once he was confident that he was the only soul privy to the steady decline of Elizabeth Parker's sanity, he waved a palm over the sturdy lock that kept him away from the young woman, his other hand holding onto the thin receipt within his jacket.

She did not acknowledge his presence immediately, too wrapped up in her blanket of agony. When he flung his dripping coat onto the counter, he heard her choked gasp. Watched her wipe furiously at her face in quiet mortification. Watched her scramble to her feet, trying her best to obtain that outward projection of the robot he so detested. The difference now, though, lay in the fact that he had _seen_ her. "Michael," she tried, her voice breaking on the dual syllables. "Wh-what are you doing here?"

Her feigned nonchalance hurt to watch.

He was fully aware that he had not the first clue of what to say to her. She was hiccuping in the wake of an interrupted emotional release and her eyes, much too large for her small face, glittered beneath the lights of the closed café_._ He doubted she could see clearly, let alone focus as her gaze jumped everywhere in her wild-eyed panic before some Parker steel finally set in and she visibly forced herself to stop. Her jaw clenched. "I…" he began, floundering a bit. She was still eying him wearily, her body shivering. She was tense and tired—and so was he, but for entirely different reasons. He did not do the comfort thing well on a normal basis and consoling Maria had left him somber, but with his rage at Liz completely drained, a new understanding that had surprised him when he was sure Little Miss Scientist could no longer shock him, he no longer knew where to stand. Where to move, what to say, what to do. Vaguely, Michael recalled lying in a foreign bed before his emancipation, surrounded by Maria's soothing embrace… but he doubted Liz would appreciate that.

This was awkward. Really, really awkward. He drove a hand through his hair, annoyed at himself for being an idiot. He should have just stayed out there and let her grieve until she was spent. He would have made sure prying eyes did not catch her, would have stood guard outside that damned window until she was good and ready to let him in. This was not about him or his selfish need to empathize with a small reflection of himself, his need to hold that trembling ball of sadness as he wished someone would have held _him_ so many years ago. This was not about him or his insecurities, either.

A puff of air escaped his nose. She was absolutely fucking _exhausting_, he thought, even as he came forth and enclosed her tightly in his arms. In typical Parker fashion, she stiffened in his embrace but he was not daunted or offended. She had no one to support her in the aftermath of her wild allegations and her behavior had effectively pushed away everyone in their mismatched group. If she did not relent to the unlikely but still available source of comfort from Michael, she would have no shoulder to cry on and he knew _exactly_ how that felt. The choice was entirely hers and as he felt her melt against him, ducking her head under his chin, he was a little proud of her for being sensible enough—as if she could be anything else, in spite of recent events—to accept this small offering despite her initial misgivings.

Her arms wound around his torso, her body trying to squeeze into his warmth until they were no longer two separate beings. "Thank you," she warbled in an uneven voice, tears sneaking past her defenses. She did not scream or wail with the same vehemence as before, but she muffled her sobs in his chest anyway, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt as he ran his fingers through her hair.

It would be a long time before he let her go.


	2. The Second

_Cry Your Name_

**THE SECOND**

"Would you like some coffee?" Parker was saying, sniffling quietly.

"Uh," he mumbled unintelligibly, jerking from his reverie. "Sure. That'd be good." Blinking tired eyes, he tried to focus on her face, watching as the bone-weary exhaustion seemed to settle even deeper. She nodded minutely, smiling a little as she slowly shuffled to the coffee machine in the kitchen. His stare lingered even as the door closed behind her and he let out a breath of air, relieved for a moment alone to think.

When Liz had desperately clung to him, he'd seen and felt a myriad of images—thoughts, emotions and scenes—that he was still, an hour later, trying to make sense of. Not unlike the brief pictures he had gained from his intimacy with Maria, it startled him that he would receive these flashes from Liz. They had all believed the strange connection formed between a human and hybrid to be related to passion—kissing, specifically, or _other_ forms of physical entanglements—but there were no romantic notions between Liz Parker and himself… not that he _knew_ of, anyway. Sure, the girl was attractive in her own, bookworm kind of way—maybe _more_ than attractive if he were to be honest, which he was not—but _that_ kind of passion? The kind of emotional dependence that Maxwell Evans had thrived on when he and Liz were lost in their own little fantasy, the physical need to touch and kiss her… the kind of need to hold her, protect her and love her with a devotion that bordered on hopeless… could he _ever_ feel that way about Elizabeth Parker?

_Fuck_ no.

He was more than confident that the feeling was mutual. There was no way in _hell_ he would ever involve himself with Liz Parker in _that_ manner, so why did he feel her sadness as acutely as if it were his own? Why had he seen her speaking to Kyle, asking for an undisclosed favor? Why did he know _exactly _when she and Alex had met, down to the hour? Why did he suddenly know her favorite ice cream flavor and her Grandma Claudia's last words? He'd witnessed a thousand different photographs in the cavern of her mind, blinking in and out of existence quicker than he could register, each one bringing with it a multitude of thoughts and half-formed ideas that made his head spin. Liz Parker thought _way_ too much, he concluded, rubbing his eyes absently. Even as he tried to dismiss the waterfall of _everything_ that encompassed the young Miss Parker, the throbbing sorrow remained apparent… even now… even as she stood in an entirely different room, far away from his touch and the booth in which he sat. The foreign sensation took him a moment to realize that the emotions were not his own. The feel of her in his arms as he held her was a ghost on his skin, but it did nothing to pale the inexplicable sting in his nerve endings.

Why did she always have to be so damned _complicated_? A simple, friendly gesture had given him yet another mystery to solve, as if they did not already have enough on their plates.

She returned with two steaming mugs of coffee, her eyes averted. He nodded his thanks for the strong, black liquid. When he instinctively gulped down a scalding mouthful, he was thoroughly surprised that she had known to prepare it _exactly_ to his specifications; he'd never divulged something so insignificant to her because he had never needed a reason to. Glancing from the cup in his hands, he leveled her with a narrowed, calculating glare, his brow furrowing with unease as he took in the way she nervously fidgeted with her hands and the guilty expression on her brittle face. A thought suddenly formed in his mind, unbidden and unwelcome.

"You don't like it?" she asked, her voice soft and uncertain. Her eyes flicked towards his before dropping back down to her mug.

"What did you see?" he demanded, equally soft.

He could feel her tension, her guilt, worry and unending devastation, spiked with just a tinge of trepidation. There was a pregnant pause and he could sense her hesitation, choosing her words carefully. "I'm… I'm not sure," she finally responded honestly and he felt the vice grip in his chest loosen ever so slightly. "I know you're upset with me… and I know you're significantly _less_ that elated to hear that I saw… _anything_," she muttered.

He scoffed. "And _you're_ still in a piss-poor mood."

"That's an understatement," she conceded, finally meeting his gaze. Her hackles rose with his obvious disdain, her annoyance pulsating around him fretfully.

With the reappearance of her composure came the sudden void, the swirling whirlpool of her emotions locked away as if he had never felt them. He began to wonder if he had imagined it all, disregarding the intoxicating current still thrumming in his veins. He felt stunted in the aftermath. "Why are you here, Michael?" she inquired with an exasperated huff. She did not seem to notice the odd closure of _whatever-the-hell_ had happened.

He decided to forgo the interrogation, still reeling from the loss. "I was gonna rip you a new one," he answered, running a palm over his eyes in confusion.

"I beg your pardon?" She was not impressed.

"You heard me." Neither was he.

She rolled her eyes. "I'm assuming you're referring to this afternoon," she deduced. Her stare became hard. "I'm not wrong," she bit out vehemently. "I _know_ what I know, and I _will_ find out the truth."

He watched as her spine straightened and her chin hitched up a notch, that steely determination returning in all of its glory. _This_ was Liz Parker, he thought with a tiny spark of admiration, not that screeching wraith he'd stumbled across in his rage. This was the same girl who had ventured to the trailer of a boy she barely knew out of genuine concern, warning him of Topolsky's perusal when Max had dismissed her worries as paranoia. He did not understand why he had the urge to grin at her and say _'Atta girl_, but he quickly stifled that odd notion and stood, reaching for his discarded coat. "I'm not saying you're right," he warned, digging through the pockets until his fingers caught the crinkled slips of paper within. He brought the still damp jacket with him to his seat, laying the carbon copies in front of her curious eyes.

Her eyebrows knit together, tilting her head to the side. "What is this?"

"Some delivery boy gave it to me," he elaborated as he tossed back the rest of his coffee, licking his lips to savor the taste. "It was a receipt for Alex. Said the company declined it 'cause of the weird signature."

"This is _Alex's_ signature?" The slips shook loudly in her grasp. For a moment in its briefest existence, he felt her again. The gripping, suffocating anguish that bounced off of the walls roared to life, revealing her poignant reaction to this bit of information before the caressing sensation evaporated once more. He blinked rapidly in its wake, rubbing his face again.

It was starting to give him a headache. He reached out to lay a calming hand on her wrist, halting the tremors that he could see spreading throughout her frame. "Could you stop that?" he asked gruffly. Michael did his best to hide the growing irritation at her and this rollercoaster she was putting him through, especially since he was itching to figure out _why_ it was happening in the first place. Instead, he was prioritizing the issues at hand. Whether she was conscious of it or not, she was projecting much too loudly for him to ignore and it was chaos to his senses; one moment he was fine, but in the next he was torn between wrapping his arms around her again and sobbing his heart out. He was sure he would make an ass of himself if she did not stop putting him through the wringer. "I know you're…" Upset? Unstable? Words were never his strong suit and that still proved true. He tried anyway. "… a little shaken up right now," he continued, forcing himself to look calmly into her wide eyes, "but you gotta stop doing that."

She nodded, unable to speak.

He gave her a few moments to stare at the string of ones and zeros, relinquishing her wrist only when he knew she would not relapse into that trembling hopelessness he was beginning to detest almost as much as her automaton persona. "What does it mean?" he asked, genuinely curious. Liz was the science geek where Alex had been the computer whiz, but perhaps she had picked up a few things from her late friend. Michael knew _he_ could never understand it, and were it not for a few influences picked up along the way, he would not have even known that it was called binary to begin with; he knew it had something to do with programming, he knew they represented letters and he knew that someone with the right inclination could code and decode if they used it correctly. "I'm guessing it says his name," he prodded further when her eyes met his again. He frowned when he realized that she had not heard him, staring _through_ him in a trance.

"It means…" she breathed in the throes of an epiphany, "it means… _'I have promises to keep… and miles to go before I sleep'_."


	3. The Third

_Cry Your Name_

**THE THIRD**

It must have held a world of promise and revelation for her, but Michael was confused as to how poetry answered anything. "Parker," he tried, thoroughly baffled as he could practically see the gears rapidly turning in her head. Was he missing something? "Could you speak in normal people English, not A.P. English? Robert Frost isn't really helping me out here."

She visibly shook herself from whatever daze she'd fallen into and gave him a sincere smile. "I knew there was a reason you were in my class."

"Yeah, 'cause it takes a real genius to remember _that_ one," he countered cynically, scratching his forehead. He ignored the subtle flattery and quickly doused the warm glow of pleasure at the off-handed compliment he heard hidden in her words, focusing on the subject at hand. "You mind cluing me in?"

Her smile ebbed into a frown. "I thought you didn't believe me," she stated with a hint of arrogance.

He shrugged. "I didn't say I did."

She retrieved the mug of coffee they had both forgotten, sipping the chilled liquid with a grimace. "Then it shouldn't matter to you."

He did not speak for a moment, reaching over to heat the cooled coffee in her hands. She rewarded him with a tight smile of appreciation, even when he schooled his features to remain completely expressionless. Unfortunately, his façade of cool indifference did little to quell her avid perusal of his face, her dark eyes scanning him with frightening accuracy in search of the chink in his armor. It annoyed him when she did that, studying him like some kind of specimen to be picked apart and labeled; it brought back childhood nightmares of being captured by the fearsome humans as an experiment, cut open without a single thought or care about the hybrids or their lives. Liz Parker was the only one in their dwindling group who could inspire such a weakness—a _child's_ weakness, no less—and it reminded him why he had never really bothered to do the friendship-bonding thing with her. "Look," he began tersely, "I know you, Parker, and you're gonna go ahead and run around chasing this theory of yours until you prove one of us right. Personally? I wanna be around to say '_I told you so'_."

She somehow managed toss him an indignant glare, even with her red, puffy eyes and flustered pallor. "You'll only hinder me, Michael. I _don't_ need your help."

He leaned forward, his forearms resting on the table between them. "Who said I was helping you?"

She mimicked him, gently placing her mug in front of her. "Then why bother? You'll be a liability and I can't afford that. You," she pointed, her finger inches from his nose, "can stay here and take care of the others. I'm going to do this myself, and I _will_ prove you wrong."

He grinned unrepentantly in the face of her little monologue. It was obvious from the phrasing—"_You'll be a liability"_—that she remembered, as he did, when Max was captured after the shapeshifter Nascedo had assumed the young man's form to kidnap Liz. When everyone had finally calmed down enough to form a plan to rescue Max, Tess had calmly informed the humans that they could not accompany them. That they were _liabilities_ and would only get in the way since they did not possess any powers. That would piss anyone off, he supposed, especially coming from a tiny blonde with suspicious motives.

Michael wondered if Parker felt better now, being able to throw that back at an alien, regardless of which one had actually flung the words in her face to begin with. He remembered receiving pleasure from simple wordplay before, when it gave him a sense of vindictive pride and victory to get the last laugh. Then again, perhaps he was reading too much into a simple explanation; Liz Parker may have been one of the smarter ones, but she was still a female… and if Maria was any indication, girls could make mountains out of a molehill. The thought made him chuckle, amazed at the level of paranoia dating the young DeLuca had given him. "Cute speech, Parker. Now, if you're done sticking your head up your ass, might I remind you that you accused _aliens_ of killing Alex?" She continued to glower and did not reply. "I'll take that as a 'yes'." She crossed her arms, amusing him greatly. "Let's say you _are_ right, and you find out this douchebag offed Alex for whatever reason. What the _fuck_ are you gonna do when you catch up to this guy?"

Hook, line and sinker. To his eternal satisfaction, silence met his inquiry. Evidently, even the brain child did not always think things through. "Exactly," he said with relish, leaning back.

She was irritated at him, her lips tightening into a single, flat line. "So you're offering to be my _bodyguard_?"

"I'm not offering, Liz."

A small growl of frustration in the back of her throat was the only warning she gave that she'd had enough of his presumptions. Her hands slammed down onto the table, sloshing the contents of her mug over the rim. He doubted she noticed as she stood, towering over him. "I _don't_ need your arrogance and I _don't_ need _you_!" Her curtain of hair fell forward to shield her face from him and he quirked a brow at her temper tantrum. "You don't even give a shit," she swore at him, both startling him and escalating his amusement. He must have really pressed the right button if she'd stooped to cursing, which was not a trait he usually associated with Elizabeth Parker. "None of you actually believe a _goddamned_ thing I said. In fact, if I remember correctly, _you_ flew out the door right after Max like the good little puppy you are!" His anger boiled over and he was on his feet before she'd finished her exclamation, imitating her stance as he braced himself on his palms, inches from her upturned face; if she wanted to continue this, he would _not_ make it easy on her. She did not cower or stop her tirade, barreling on without a care. "Now you expect me to believe that you're willing to _protect _me? The only one that actually _listened_ to me was Kyle. _Kyle!_"

His eyes narrowed at her. "No _shit_ Kyle believed you," he spat, preparing to twist the knife. "_Any_ guy will listen when his piece of ass is at stake!"

In retrospect, he should have seen it coming. Even as he watched the lightning-quick arc of her arm dart forward, he should have known what her reaction would be. Still, a part of him never expected little Lizzie to actually slap him so hard that his face snapped to the side, his cheek stinging in the wake of her violent response. "You don't know _anything_," she shrieked, shaking with rage. "Don't you _dare_ judge me when you don't even know what you're talking about!"

"It's not that fucking complicated, Parker!" He matched her volume, his roar ringing in his own ears. "Just because a guy _fucks_ you doesn't mean he's gonna be your knight-in-shining-armor! Get your goddamn head outta La-La Land for five fucking seconds and join the real world because where _I_ come from, it ain't all sunshine and daisies!"

"_You_ come from another planet!"

"Doesn't change the fact that you're acting like a bitch!"

"And _you're_ acting like an asshole!"

Somewhere along the way, he'd forgotten what his original argument was. They were simply spouting off at each other without any real direction or point to make. He did not realize that she'd lost control of her emotions again as he tossed back every volley she threw at him, her fury cackling across their skin. It magnified his own until tiny sparks danced around them in an erratic display, embers fizzling out before they could fully ignite into an inferno neither one of them were completely aware of. His nose brushed against hers, his haggard breath mingling with her angry huffs, and his vision tunneled on her face like a target. They never skipped a beat in the cacophony of their anger, leaping into tangents that had absolutely nothing to do with the discussion that lead them here until he heard himself shouting, "_I'm_ not the one that cheated on the _love of her life_ with the same poor bastard she dumped him for!"

"I don't have to explain myself to you! I told you not to—"

"I don't give a _shit_ what you said!" he interrupted. "You manipulate everyone you—"

"—_talk about what you have no business—_"

"—_fucking touch, you selfish—_"

"—_butting your big nose into, you hypocritical—_" Her mug imploded, splashing hot coffee all over them. Neither one noticed.

"—_backstabbing—_"

"—_arrogant—_" The salt and pepper shakers exploded.

"—_two-timing—_"

"—_I never slept with Kyle!_"

The windows in the front end of the restaurant shattered, effectively drowning out his final insult. Every glass surface in the building that he could see ruptured, spraying them with tiny shards and Michael instinctively lunged forward, covering her body with his own until he was sure it was safe. Only their frantic breathing sliced through the thick silence left in the aftermath, dragging them out of the demented cocoon of rage they'd fallen into. They broke from their heated stare, taking in the destruction with wide, wild eyes that darted around without resting on any one surface too long. In the shocked stillness, he felt her anger flicker and die, only to be replaced with overwhelming distress. She was afraid, but she'd proven she was hardly intimidated by him if the level of her rancor were any indication. It confused him to no end and when he returned his gaze to hers, searching for answers, she did the same and flushed a deep crimson, noting their close proximity. Embarrassment swirled around him, weak yet tangible, before the dizzying effect of her reigning in her emotions left him weary… and little bit lonely, which he refused to acknowledge.


	4. The Fourth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE FOURTH**

He was a few blocks away from his apartment when he came to the sudden realization that he had not accomplished anything.

Not a _single_ damned thing.

After their brief exchange of words that dripped with venom, Michael had fixed the damage with a wave of his hand. It _still_ bothered him how easily he'd lost control back there, and to such a magnitude that if Jeffrey or Nancy Parker had been home, there would have been a lot of half-assed explanations to stumble through for the next week… and still keep his job as a fry cook. Thankfully, the Parker parents left their only child to manage the Crash Down with very little aide more often than not—which made him wince, since he had essentially flown off the handle at his temporary _boss_—so once the mess was erased, they had only each other to deal with.

There was a long moment of uncomfortable silence before Liz decided she was too tired to continue. Michael had agreed, having noted the hour. Neither apologized for their actions, he remembered, and Michael simply shuffled towards the door with Liz in tow. When he stepped into the early morning chill left in the wake of the bitter storm, he turned to look at her before she closed the door behind him, uncertain and quietly choking on words and thoughts left unsaid. Her arms were wrapped around herself again, that pitiful weakness returning just when he had been sure she was past it, and Michael could not suppress the urge to embrace her in spite of the matters that remained unsettled between them. Some things were simply beyond quarrels. It was surprisingly natural to hold her; he had thought it would be quick and awkward, given their histories and clashing personalities, but Elizabeth Parker proved him wrong by melting into him with a shaky sigh of relief. "Thank you, Michael," she murmured against his collarbone, her voice cracking. They stayed there for a short while with the subtle fragrance of her dark tresses tickling his nose until she yawned widely, an obvious cue to call it a night.

"Chin up, Parker," he remembered tossing over his shoulder, stepping onto the wet cement. He glanced back once, soaking in her tired smile, and began the long walk home.

He did not get far. "Wait!"

He'd stopped in his tracks and caught sight of her jogging towards him; his stride easily doubled hers and in the few seconds of him leaving her, it took her twice as long to catch up. "What?" he barked a little harsher than he'd intended, scanning her face for any indication of what she wanted. He was _so_ over this. Over _her_.

"Michael," she breathed, strands of hair catching in her open mouth. "Tomorrow."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Tomorrow… what?"

"I'll talk to you tomorrow." She looked away. "Maybe."

Michael rolled his eyes. "Whatever, Parker."

She caught him off his guard when she slipped her arms around his torso, squeezing once before she let him go. Her expression gave nothing away, but her words were softly spoken. "I just… I-I just wanted to thank you. Again."

"You already said that," he groused, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

She nodded, her head bobbing twice in this odd, jerky motion. "I know. I'm, uh…" she faltered. "I'll, uh… good night!" And she was gone, running back to the Crash Down.

What the fuck had _that_ been about? He shook his head, his brow furrowed as he watched her lock her door and retreat into her home without a backward glance. Maria had a habit of acting weird during even weirder times, something he usually contributed to a female's monthly cycle, but it was all right for his girlfriend to act strangely around him; it was decidedly _not_ okay for Elizabeth Parker to. He did his best not to think of it as such—maybe he was just overanalyzing everything because not only did he _not_ enjoy the insinuation that Liz would act like some shy teenager around him, he did not like the idea of his brother's ex-girlfriend finding him… well, anything other than her best friend's boyfriend. This was, undoubtedly, Maria's influence on his psyche and he was embarrassed that he'd even entertained the notion, quickly turning with a self-derisive chuckle and continuing the route he'd begun before Liz had interrupted him.

After shoving those wayward—and _ridiculous_—thoughts into the darkest hole he could find, Michael kept his mind blank for as long as possible, fully aware of his annoying habit to wander around for hours until he'd sorted through the crap flying around his head. He needed _sleep_, damn it, and sauntering around Roswell with all of the information that wanted to burst out of the careful niche he'd shoved it into would _not_ help him get any.

The moment he made it past the threshold of his apartment, he knew his efforts had been in vain. Every detail he'd retained from his encounter with Liz came flooding forward. Liz crying, Liz screaming, Liz shouting… everything was Liz, Liz, _Liz_. Her words, her demeanor… the strange connection initiated simply because he tried to quell her raging agony, the flare of raw emotion whenever he'd pushed her too far. The whole night with her had been one unexplainable event after another, confusing and frustrating him until he found himself pacing the length of his living room with his hands alternating from his hips to his hair.

He was still sore with her on the subject of Alex. His skin prickled at the idea of someone dying simply because they were involved with the hybrids. It made him downright nauseous; if Alex lost his life due to alien involvement—_theirs_, specifically—who would be next? Kyle? Maria? _Liz_? Who would the abyss claim next thanks to the four extraterrestrials?

He was well aware of the war brewing between Elizabeth Parker and Maxwell Evans, knew that the proclamation she'd thrown in her former paramour's face like an accusation was meant to hurt, but the audacity of her to just… to just _blurt_ it out like that, like a little girl getting the final say and thoroughly satisfied when all was said and done. She'd made her point and had not, for an instant, backed down from her stance, even when she was left with only Kyle at her side—Maria, he was sure, had been beyond caring at that time, indulging in memories of her childhood friend in a way that Liz had not done. How could Liz say those things, with such certainty, in Alex's room? Not even a full hour after Michael had helped carry the casket and watched as they buried one of his only friends on this Earth. His anger had flared and had he not vacated the room, he could not be held accountable for his actions against the young, pigheaded Miss Parker.

Then, to his utter irritation, she had to go and sob her bleeding heart out when she thought she'd been alone.

He cared now, and he was not happy about it. _At all_. He'd had a specific purpose to seeing Parker that evening, a purpose that had flown out of the proverbial window at the sight of her. He had been able to deal with Maria wailing for hours on end, but one look at the young woman he swore he absolutely _detested_ as she shivered and shook like a dying, autumn leaf… it had nearly unmanned him. He'd found himself in that tiny ball of hysteria and it pissed him off that he could no longer hate someone when he knew exactly what she was doing and why. He had even gone so far as to imply that he'd help her along with this investigation, even when he knew Maxwell would not be pleased.

Forcibly pushing aside the violent musings in regards to the inevitable confrontation he was sure would occur with their alien King, Michael focused on another tangent that disturbed him. Delving deeper, he remembered the caressing tendrils of Liz's mind, soothing and sweet and luring him with every explosion of emotion she could not reign in. That alone sent him into a frenzy of nerves and his paced hastened in his growing agitation. What _was_ that? Why had it happened? Where had it come from? She had been out of control, sure, but he had never even connected with Maria so deeply, so completely. When he had attempted to glean some insight into the quirky blonde, he had been doubly sure to block himself from her in an act of self-preservation. Thistime, _he_ had been the one lost in the crossfire, unable to discern where his mind ended and Liz Parker's began. Unfortunately, he _knew _Liz had caught something and he was suddenly furious that he had not torn the information out of her, too overwhelmed with this new empathy he could not explain. He blamed his own surprise for the transgression but it did nothing to soothe him.

What had she seen?

What did she know?

_What was going on?_

Around and around he paced, unable to stop. Their argument made him cringe when he thought about it, but he did not regret his reactions to her; he had _never_ destroyed so much in his rage before. When he tried to control his wayward powers, he had never reached that magnitude of destruction, especially to such a wide range. Agent Pierce had been the exception, but at this rate… how many people could he kill, _would_ he kill, if the situation called for it? Not so long ago, the death of one man had taken an enormous amount of desperation, but if he could wipe out dozens during a fit of uncontrollable temper… he had to get a hold of himself before he lost it. Michael could feel the gradual descent into a deep, black mood, his train of thought snowballing into images and memories from his nightmares. _Damn_ Liz Parker. Damn her and her _damn_ conspiracy theories and her choking sobs and the way she knew how he liked his coffee. He would never forgive her. Continuing to condemn the exasperating Parker despite the glaring knowledge that she was not completely to blame in this endless debacle, he speared his fingers through his hair, glancing at the clock mounted on the far wall. It read a harrowing three in the morning.

Perfect, just _fucking_ perfect.

He had to get some sleep, _now_, before he officially lost his mind.


	5. The Fifth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE FIFTH**

It came as no surprise when he was late for school later on that morning.

A few hours of slumber had done nothing to stop the millions of half-formed ideas and questions running around in his head, but it gave him the calm he'd forgotten sometime after arriving home. Michael had almost blown off school for the day, but he remembered Maria who had no foundation without him now that Liz was obsessed with her personal crusade. His girlfriend needed him there, and he needed to speak to Liz. Again.

And try not to yell at her.

_Again_.

Maria was easy enough to find. She was taking pictures as a part of a project for the yearbook, a collage that represented everything in the life of Alexander Whitman. Unsurprisingly, Maria was exempt from classes for the next day or so as long as she promised to make up the work; in a small town like Roswell, everyone knew everyone and _everyone_ knew how close the Three Musketeers had been, so it was no wonder the young Miss DeLuca had been chosen to head and complete the project. Once she had explained what she needed, he was quick to comply and offer a hand to take some of the load off of her tired shoulders—some color copies, a few things from the office supply store and a ride to Alex's home after school. It was easy to manage Maria, and Michael was infinitely grateful that the young woman he'd found a handful so long ago was as easy as pie in comparison to Elizabeth Parker; none of the dizzying emotions, none of the turmoil and completely devoid of the overwhelming shroud of confusion that engulfed him whenever he had to deal with her. A few, simple errands and Maria would be happy. Quick, sweet and simple. _Perfect_.

Classes were changing by the time he left Maria alone to make the copies she needed. Tucking the manila folder full of photos under his arm, Michael leisurely made his way through the crowded corridor and would have completely missed her had he not spotted Maxwell glaring down at her, his jaw tense. Max was gripping Parker's forearm tightly, entirely too intense for a friendly conversation, and when he heard Liz command the reborn King to let her go with an imperial tone, Michael had to withhold a chuckle at the pure irony of the situation.

Liz brushed by him, her eyes straying to his for a moment before they darted forward, dark and shuttered. Michael recognized the Lizbot emerging, completely shutting down for the sake of her self-appointed mission. He wanted to grab her and continue their stunted conversation, sans yelling, but with Max glaring after her like he was ready to chase her down and throttle the shit out of her—something Michael could relate to—it did not seem like the best course of action. Instead, he sauntered over to Max, observing the young man for a moment. If there had ever been true love between those two, there was certainly none now; as annoying as Maria could be on her worst days, Michael had never given her the hateful stare that Max now sported, all directed towards the small brunette with more balls than anyone gave her credit for. "The hell was _that_ about?" Michael asked nonchalantly, as if he had no clue what had transpired.

"She's asking questions," Max bit out, as if he had swallowed something particularly disgusting.

Whoa. "It's a free country," Michael quipped, frowning a little at the thinly veiled hostility.

Max leveled him with that same angry glower before Michael watched him calm himself down, safe in the presence of his brother. "She's going to raise suspicions, Michael. It's dangerous and she's not thinking straight."

"Why? Who's Liz accusing us of murdering today?"

It had been a simple joke to lighten the mood, but Max took it seriously and Michael wished he'd kept his big mouth shut. "I don't know, but this has got to stop. _Now_." Max looked to where Liz had departed, but she was already gone. "Everything's falling apart," he continued, his voice low. "First Isabel and this college thing, now Liz with this ridiculous theory… am I the only one that notices it?"

No, he wasn't, but far be it for Michael to snap Max out of his brooding. "What if she's right?"

That was the worst thing he could possibly say. Michael did not know what was going on with his linguistic skills today, but they were _not_ in tandem with his common sense. "_What?_" Max was incredulous, as expected.

Michael did not flinch at the sharp eyes focused on him. He shrugged with a flippancy he did not feel. "I'm not exactly a Parker fan myself, but what if she is?"

Max shook his head. "No," he barked. "She's _wrong_, and the only thing she's doing is putting _us_ at risk!"

"Lower your voice," Michael warned. People were starting to get curious. "Listen, I gotta make some copies," he explained, motioning towards the folder in his arm. "I'll catch you later."

Max muttered a farewell and with a brief nod, they parted ways, Michael staring after him. To say that Maxwell's uncharacteristic display unsettled him would be an understatement, but Michael knew firsthand how Liz could drive any sane individual to complete madness. It appeared she could cause even their normally shy, quiet leader to lose his cool. He wondered if Max had felt the same explosive connection as Michael did last night, but he somehow doubted it if that neutral expression on Liz's face was any indication. She would probably double whatever defenses she had when in proximity to Max, if she was smart. And she was.

Michael found another opportunity to pull Liz aside for a tête-à-tête after a fierce battle with the shitty copy machine in West Roswell High School's even shitter main office. The receptionists kept throwing him dirty looks the entire time and just as he was about to blast the damn thing into a million burning pieces, to hell with witnesses, the stupid copier _finally_ spat out a low resolution picture that could—if he squinted, turned his head and took a bullet in the eye—pass for a photo of Alex smiling, standing between the only two girls who had stuck with him through thick and thin. The image brought back the ghost of sorrow as he remembered Maria's unintelligible cries when Max could not revive him and the eerie emptiness in Parker's face. Isabel's muffled tears as she sobbed into a pillow, Max's glassy eyes as he realized his greatest failure. Jim and Kyle Valenti trying to mask their sadness as they held a quiet Tess on their way to the car. Alex's father, a tall man who stared at his son's casket with unabashed anguish… no one was left unaffected by Alex Whitman's passing, and this picture just hammered that point home.

He was clearing his throat when he felt her. _Felt_ her, not saw. Without turning, he knew Liz was there, quiet and still. "Are you almost done? I don't have much time before class starts."

"G'head," he replied, his voice gruff. He stepped aside and took a moment to compose himself.

She moved to the copier, a small bundle of cards, a torn piece of lined paper and a few photographs in her arms. She caught sight of the low quality copy lying in the tray and froze, one hand paused in mid-air as it reached for the buttons on the machine. "You're…" she swallowed, her eyes never leaving the fuzzy image on the thin paper. Her fingers shook and Michael swore that if she fell apart again, he was going to blindfold and lock her in Alex's room for the rest of her life until she learned how to mourn like a normal human being. A flicker of longing kissed his skin and he knew she had been rattled, but the sensation quickly disappeared and he waited for the onslaught. Even Maria was coping and did not turn into a puddle of mush at every turn; Liz, however, kept everything bottled up inside and seemed to lose it at the drop of a hat when she least expected it.

To his relief, she did not turn on the hysterics. "It was his birthday," she said in a whisper, nostalgic.

"Liz," he said, equally low. Reminiscing was all well and good, but there were matters to be discussed. "About yesterday—"

"I'm not sorry," she interrupted, strong and even.

He nodded. "Neither am I. But that's not what I'm talking about. If you're still gonna—"

"One condition," she cut in again, and it was all he could do to not snap at her. At his silence, she continued. "If you're going to help, we do this _my_ way. No Max, no hassling me _about_ Max, _nothing_." She eyed him for a moment and he tried not to glare, already full with his daily dose of Elizabeth Parker. "I'm only agreeing to this because I need someone to keep him away from me and you're one of the only people he will listen to. I _don't _need him slowing me down. Is that clear?"

When had Max _ever_ listened to him? That was a joke, in and of itself. He scratched at his scalp. "Fine," he agreed between gnashing teeth. "But I have a condition, too."

She was already shaking her head. "I already told you, we're going to do this my—"

"Can you work this damn thing?" It felt good to cut _her_ off this time, and he was thankful for little victories.

"Oh." She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Sure." The thick tension always present when he was near Liz evaporated and she seemed just as relieved as he to lay aside their differences, their steadfast disagreements and their general avoidance of each other. Very rarely did Michael interact with Elizabeth outside some immanent crisis, for very specific reasons; one of those involved the monumental headache she gave him. As she rattled off instructions like a personified instruction manual, the normalcy in the exchange was unexpected, though not entirely unwelcome. She was a good instructor, explaining how to set up the photographs in order to conserve time and paper, without the condescending attitude he usually received when he bothered to ask other educators to clarify on areas he did not comprehend on the first try. After he made a few copies on his own without error, he was officially dubbed the King of all Copiers and Liz openly snickered at him when he rolled his eyes.

The bell rang, signaling that Liz was going to be late for her next class. Michael stole the pile of paper from her arms and told her to go, that he'd take care of it. When she protested, he pushed her towards the door with the promise that he would place the originals _and_ the copies in her locker, so stop worrying so much. She had to get her ass to class. Besides, he was the King of the Copier and as King, only _he_ could command his subjects and he'd be damned if some random female tried to usurp his throne.

It was Parker's turn to roll her eyes. She eventually complied, a small smile on her face as she strode from the office with more aplomb than he'd seen her display in the last twenty-four hours.

Wait. _Aplomb?_

Michael gritted his teeth at the SAT vocabulary that had snuck up on him, shuddering a little at the memory of the nationwide test every junior in America had taken last year. He shook away the horror, shuffling through the various articles of papers he'd taken from Liz; a postcard from the Olsen's to the Whitman family and the envelope it came in, a picture of Alex with the Olsen family, a picture of Alex standing by a girl named Leanna in front of a tower, the infamous photo with Alex's face torn off, the carbon copies he'd given her last night and a piece of jagged lined paper with the same sequence of ones and zeros printed in Parker's neat script.

These were clues. Little Miss Scientist had turned into Little Miss Detective overnight. Quickly arranging the scraps to fit on one letter-sized page, he made two sets of copies; he had been honest when he told Liz he'd let her have her way, but that did not mean Michael would not pursue his own avenue of research.


	6. The Sixth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE SIXTH**

Elizabeth Parker was falling down an endless spiral and she was bringing everyone along for the ride.

He caught her during their lunch hour less than a week after their truce by the copier, pilfering a cigarette—of all the stupid, idiotic things this little lunatic has done… a _cigarette_—from a passing student in the shadows behind the bleachers. Upon watching her slink through the crowd after classes, Michael had followed her until he saw the exchange, hardly believing that she would do something so incredibly… he did not know whether to smack her senseless or wash his hands of this whole scenario and just let her kill herself. Not that he would actually let her do something so uncharacteristically Liz, as much as he wished he could, but the idea of simply leaving her to her own devices right then would solve a lot of his problems. Thunderously infuriated with this new level of aggravation she presented, he stalked through crisp, evergreen blades of grass and promptly ripped the rolled tobacco from her pursed lips, tossing the offending thing away from her.

She glared at him, lighter still in hand. "_God_, you're _everywhere_!"

"And you're a fucking moron," he countered, entering another realm of pissed. "What the _fuck_ was _that_ about, Parker? I leave you alone for a few days and now you're a smoker?"

"It was my first one," she defended, her brows furrowed together. "You're not my father, Michael."

"Yeah? I'm sure he'd love to hear all about how his little girl is stealing cigarettes at school." Michael scratched his brow, trying not to strangle her. "That shit will _kill _you!" How had Maxwell dealt with her? He could not be in her presence for more than a moment before his anger got the best of him. "Am I gonna have to put you on a goddamned leash? I can't take my eyes off of you for _one fucking second_ without you doing something retarded." Her face was flushing at his words, but he was too fired up to care about her feelings. "If this is some kind of teenage rebel bullshit, you get that outta your head _now_. None of us have time to deal with daddy's little princess bitching for attention, and I'm sure as hell _not_ in the mood to take care of you all the fucking time, so get your shit together and _knock it the fuck off!_"

She pushed at his chest, embarrassment and rage propelling her forward. Liz was not a violent person by any means and even though she had slapped the living daylights out of him before, it had been in the heat of very intense argument; something was going on in that dizzying head of hers and he wanted to know exactly what it was, because he did not know how long he could go on watching her trip, stumble and fall every time he turned around. "Back off!" she cried, her voice unnaturally high and shrill. "I have my own life, and I'll do whatever I please with it!"

"Like break into the _fucking_ school with _Sean?_" he roared, completely past trying to calm down. A part of him acknowledged the now familiar fog of her emotions circling them, but he found no comfort in the touch; the mix of guilt, fear, anger, sadness, hatred and jealousy made his stomach churn. He'd never felt anything so horrible in his entire life, even at the hands of his former guardian. Michael inwardly flinched away from the cold fingers of her psyche, jagged icicles replacing the warm radiance he remembered finding there. "News flash, Parker: _everything you do has a consequence_. Dragging Douchebag DeLuca into the fucking picture isn't a life, it's _pointless_ and all you're doing is causing trouble for the rest of us!" He took a breath, shaking with unreleased energy. It was taking everything he had to control his powers, lest the bleachers become a ball of crumpled metal around them. "I swear, Parker… one more fuck up like this and I am _personally_ gonna lock you in a _goddamned _closet until you get your _fucking_ head on straight. _Are we clear?_"

He barely recognized her anymore. Her voice, her eyes… she was a spitting, half-crazed banshee, nothing like the calm, levelheaded waitress he'd come to grudgingly respect. "You're a megalomaniacal _asshole_, Michael!" And again, with the profanity. That was twice now. _He _used foul language all of the time, but Liz had been raised better than that. Sure, they were in the midst of verbal warfare, but it was so unlike her that it made him pause.

Before he could open his mouth to spout off at her again, her hunched shoulders, her fidgeting fingers, her wild gaze that reminded him of that wailing wraith, stopped him before he made a bad situation even worse. There was an asinine part of him that wanted to wrap her in his arms again and hold her until she stopped this… whatever it was she was doing. In fact, he had the distinct feeling that, somehow, his absence had magnified the sickening mass that fluttered around her mind like poison. No, that could not be right. He'd only been away from her for a few days, dealing with a moody Maria that harped at him for being unreliable one moment, then harped him because he was _too_ good of a boyfriend the next, which was a mystery in itself; he had Isabel to contend with as he tried to soothe his troubled sister in her path to self-discovery, all while trying to juggle this new, dark Maxwell he was not entirely sure he liked anymore. This Max was a fountain of dictation and brooding silence. This Max wanted to '_take care_' of the Parker Problem and whatever the boy had planned, it did not seem pleasant for Liz. Not to mention Amy DeLuca and her household appliances gone wild, or Maria flipping out because her best friend had gotten her convict cousin in trouble.

Michael stared at her, his temper dying a disgruntled death as he observed her pensively. She was glancing everywhere in the face of his silence, having lost her footing when he did not respond to her insult. Was she _trying_ to fight with him? What was wrong with her? She was fine the last time he'd seen her, still slipping in and out of the automaton, but still fine. If he was honest with himself, Liz had been the perfect candidate to relieve some stress upon and once he'd had his say, the argument was hardly worth the effort, _especially_ with her. Perhaps _control_ would be too strong of a word in regards to his method of madness, but with this new sense he had around her—and _only_ her, which he had yet to explore or understand—it made everything glow in a new light. He could cut through her bullshit if he just took a moment to look, and he was looking now.

It surprised him when, after witnessing her clawing at herself like a rabid dog, he realized that he'd been right about everything.

He did not know how he knew, but he was completely certain in his assessment. Subconsciously, he plucked little bits of information hovering in the forefront of her thoughts, wading through the thick, sticky swamp of her feelings. There were dark, shuddering segments that he could not decipher, shadowed photographs he could not access as hard as he tried, and he knew those were the pieces that fueled her delirium. He managed to obtain some lesser issues, however. Her parents were rarely home as they trusted their responsible daughter explicitly. Her alien circle of friends had abandoned her, her last living friend avoided her due to distraction and a personal grudge for causing the division in their group; the only people that spoke to her included Sean DeLuca, who probably could not speak to her even if he _wanted_ to now, and himself, who—in her eyes—ran hot and cold. There was always Kyle, who was off doing whatever it was that midgets did in their spare time, but Michael doubted they spoke much with the tension surrounding their betrayal towards Max still running rampant. Then again, if he remembered correctly…

"—_I never slept with Kyle!_"

Michael Guerin was all she had.

It was pathetic, if he thought about it. When _Michael_, the monumental failure, was the stable core of their fucked up group, something was very wrong. Since when did _he_ play peacekeeper? He'd slipped into the role so damn easily, too, without any forewarning or resistance. Somewhere between playing middleman for Max and Isabel, letting Maria cry on his shoulder, fixing Amy's appliances of doom, keeping Short Round—also known as Kyle—in the loop, and being the only foundation to balance out the trainwreck formerly known as Elizabeth Parker, Michael was the only one that had not buckled and crumpled under the weight. Max, their leader, was too wrapped up in himself and in trying to be a King to notice just how deep the steady decline of everyone they cared about was flowing. They were aliens, yes, but they wore human skin, bore human emotions and had very human reactions to the world around them. Right then, grieving for the loss of one of their own, they needed a friend, _not_ a King. Someone who could pick up the pieces of their broken hearts.

Everything was so clear when he pushed back his own reflex towards Liz and this unnamable… bond? Connection? Wavelength? What was it that allowed him to dust away the clutter of everyday life and gain such a startlingly accurate insight into his environment? Either it was simply her influence, or it was this ability to subtly glean the truth directly from her head once he delved through the ensnaring typhoon her emotions had become. If he tried, _really_ tried, he could open a link between them, but that would invite her into _his_ mind and he was not entirely comfortable with that yet. After all, he was still discovering the perks and limitations of this parlor trick they shared.

In essence, he was stealing Liz Parker, bit by bit. He was not sure if he should be worried, afraid, or glad that _someone_—even if it was _him_—could keep their head straight, but this codependency had to stop.

Embracing her may have not been the best way to halt the almost physical weakness he could see bubbling to the surface, but it was the only way to calm her the fuck down. He needed answers as much as she did and they would get nowhere if she kept up this psychotic behavior, never mind the damage he could see to her health if how her loose jeans were any indication. She shivered and briefly struggled to get away, but he was much stronger than her and it did little good. "Don't get used to this, Parker," he told her, his voice still harsh from yelling. She gave a weak nod against his collarbone and grabbed fistfuls of his shirt. It was unnerving how quickly she went from complaining to compliant.

She was not crying, not yet, but her tiny shoulders were shaking nonetheless. "I… Michael, there's something wrong," she mumbled, her voice muffled from the fabric.

He tried to bite back the callous, sarcastic reply that came to mind. "No shit." He failed.

She stiffened. "I'm not crazy, Michael. I'm _not_."

That, right there. How had she known what he'd idly contemplated? Even without an established connection, she could pick up on his thoughts as easily as he could hers. Thankfully, it answered one of his many questions, but there were still so many more he wanted to ask. He could not. Not with her acting like this, not with everything falling apart, not when he needed to discuss this with the sane and intelligent young woman that still lurked in the shadows of Elizabeth Parker. Gradually, the crawling web of her emotions dulled and dissipated until there was only Michael and Liz and the residue of their rocky confrontation. "We're going to talk about this eventually," he promised. "Stop snooping around my head."

He heard her snort, the closest thing to a laugh he'd heard in far too long. "It's only fair."

So she knew about that. "Yeah, but _I'm_ not the one smoking cigarettes and breaking into schools with douchebags." He spoke softly into the crown of her hair, his words still conveying his iritation at her.

"Sean's a good person," she defended in true, Liz fashion. "He did me a favor. It's _my_ fault, not his."

Michael scoffed, a tendril of dark hair stirring in response. "What was the point?" He did not notice his fingers combing through her soft strands, petting her like an agitated cat.

"I needed some paperwork from Alex's file," she explained.

He frowned. "So you went to Sean?"

"I don't know how to pick locks," was her reply, as if that was the most obvious conclusion and a perfectly reasonable one, at that.

For someone so smart, she was pretty stupid sometimes. "And you didn't think to call me?"

He felt her shrug. "You weren't around."

"I was busy."

"I know."

They stood at an impasse. Michael felt the smallest touch of guilt eat away at him; he'd finally gotten her to cooperate with him in her search for the truth behind Alex's death, and the first instance she actually _needed_ him, he'd been elsewhere. Granted, he had valid reason and she seemed to think he did as well… but it did not stop him from wishing he'd been there. He could have kept Sean from getting caught, he could have kept the fickle thread between Liz and Maria steady, he could have kept Liz from whatever plagued her so deeply that her mind was closing off into gray areas and she was trying to pick up new habits. He could have done _something_ besides fixing the DeLuca household and play medium between Max and Isabel. She'd gone to _Sean_, of all people. _Sean_. "Next time, you come to me," he told her in a tone that would suffer no arguing.

Liz choked on a short burst of giggles. "Do you even _own_ a cellphone?"

"No." He dismissed her humor. "But if I'm right, we won't need one."


	7. The Seventh

_Cry Your Name_

**THE SEVENTH**

Michael was going to _murder_ Maxwell.

Tossing another row of frozen patties onto the grill, Michael tried to not think of his irresponsible brother. It helped that a certain waitress was drumming her fingers again, that recently developed habit of hers irritating the crap out of him. The unending rhythm never stuttered and before he could flip a single burger, he'd lost his patience with her. "Quit it, Parker," he growled through clenched teeth. What _was_ it with humans and that stupid tapping? Kyle had been doing the same damned thing during class today, in that same damned beat, with that same lost expression on his goofy face; it had taken seven tries for the teacher to get the young Valenti's attention and when he had, Kyle had been startled and twitchy for the rest of the period. The memory of Thumbelina's—his favorite nickname for the former Sheriff's son—wide-eyed horror was enough to put a smirk on Michael's lips.

Just like Kyle, Liz jumped in surprise at the sound of her name. She'd been staring in his direction, but she had not been paying attention. "I'm sorry, what?"

His smirk disappeared. "Stop daydreaming, damn it. Don't you have people to flirt with?" He turned back to the sizzling meat, sorely tempted to use his abilities to hasten the process.

She scoffed in the window that separated the dining room from the kitchen. "It's called _hospitality_, Michael. You should try it some time."

Michael rolled his eyes, using the spatula to flip a darkening disc of processed beef. "Yeah, sure. I'll shake my ass a little and get a few bucks for it." He paused, annoyed that one patty had yet to join its kin. Why was this one taking so long? "If that's what you're putting on your résumé as _hospitality_, then you'd better hope Roswell opens up a strip club." He honestly did not mean anything by it and, truthfully, he was just mindlessly blowing off steam at her. His _real_ annoyance was nowhere to be found and if he allowed himself to stew in silence, he'd burn down the café in a fit of uncontrollable rage.

"Clever," replied Liz coolly. "Who knows? I could probably use this uniform. Some people find the alien theme kinky."

He could not help but chuckle, throwing her a cautionary glance over his shoulder. She was in a rare mood today. "I'm guessing you know from experience?"

To his utter surprise, she winked at him, flicking one of her fake antennae in his direction. "You caught me," she said, smiling. "Now hurry it up, Guerin. The whole _two_ people in my section are dying from old age."

"Hold your horses," he shot back, still grinning. This was actually nice, for a change. No yelling, no fighting, no need to wrestle her out of some crazed psychosis… just two high school students working at a part time job, snarking at each other during their down time. Normal. Thankfully, Agnes was on her cigarette break, so there was a wonderful absence of complaining. It helped him forget, just for a moment, how much he wanted to strangle Max for being such a moron at a time like this. Sadly, like all good things, his lighthearted musings came to an end when their leader popped back into his mind. Michael fought the intrusion of his previous frustration with tooth and nail, but the words kept echoing in his head like a morbid mantra, bugging him relentlessly.

Not only had Maxwell Evans slept with Tess Harding, but he'd gotten her pregnant. _Pregnant_. Michael wondered just how shitty his luck could actually get; he'd finally gotten a grip on the Parker situation, with her starting to act like her normal self again, and now Max had decided to drop the bomb. A _huge_ bomb. A nuclear warhead that could ruin their lives in this carnival of freaks called Roswell.

Michael finished the orders lined up, barking at Liz to quit that damned tapping she'd resumed while waiting for him. Idle banter kept him from his snowballing frustration and he was thankful that Liz had regained herself; whether it was Michael's constant, almost suffocating presence in the past few days, or if it had something to do with the breakthrough in her investigation—which she promised to explain once their shift was over—or a combination of the two, but he found himself enjoying the ease of conversation she maintained. How she countered his misplaced ire with little quips that left him smiling. How she knew exactly when to snap him out of his unsavory thoughts toward Max and focus on something trivial, like adding extra cheese to a burger and if he thought her father would approve of adding a stripper pole to attract more customers. The shift went by with little change in routine until halfway through the dinner rush, when the power abruptly shut off. Plunged into darkness, they had no choice but to close early.

"So much for tips," Liz was complaining after she had ushered the patrons away. She sat in one of the booths, counting her earnings by the candlelight.

"It's not so bad," he said, bringing out a plate of food to share. "At least we get our break."

She threw him a dry glance, her antennae wobbling a little. "Yeah, _four hours early_."

Michael stuffed a few fries into his mouth, eying her portion before he'd finished his own. A girl as tiny as Liz Parker couldn't eat _that_ much, right? "Quit your bitchin', Parker. You're still getting paid."

It did not quell her need to mope, much to his chagrin. "Do you know how much a waitress makes an hour, Michael?"

He shook his head, reaching for more Tabasco. She had yet to touch her food, he noticed with a great deal of contentment. "Fuck if _I_ know. Minimum wage?"

Liz rolled her eyes, clearly not amused. "I'm sure Maria has mentioned it in passing."

"See," he answered, taking a bite out of his burger. He ignored her visible disgust at his ability to continue speaking with a half masticated cow rolling around his open maw. "That's your first problem. You expect me to _listen_ when Maria talks?" He chewed and swallowed, chasing the mouthful down with a cool gulp of soda. "I'd rather listen to you babble about quantum physics till my ears bleed. At least it's something fucking _useful_."

She gaped at him, setting down her small wad of bills. "I…" She blinked. A frown marred her brow as she took a moment to contemplate his response. "I'm not sure if that was a compliment or an insult."

He waved away her analyzing. "Neither. Got you to stop whining about it, though."

Parker, predictably, huffed at him, offended that he would _dare_ accuse her of such a thing. "I wasn't _whining_, Michael," she grumbled. "I was merely stating the dismal state of affairs."

He snorted at the reappearance of that imperial tone. She'd gotten defensive and that meant he'd won this match, so he was perfectly fine with letting her have the last word. Finishing his burger, he motioned towards her side of the plate. "You gonna eat that?" Elizabeth Parker could go on believing her pride to be intact, as long as she handed over that meaty burger lying neglected beside several long strands of golden fries. Smart woman that she was, Liz must have understood the unspoken tradeoff and relented, rolling her eyes. She pushed the plate closer towards him and returned her attention to the bills she had yet to finish counting. Satisfied, Michael ate and enjoyed the comfortable silence, broken occasionally with Parker's random muttering about numbers.

Munching on the last of his fries, he decided it was time to quit with the pussyfooting; she'd counted that damned pile four times already. "So, what's up?"

Liz toyed with a nickel, still stalling. He glared at the thick silver coin. Who gave a nickel as a tip? As broke as he was, even with two jobs, Michael had the courtesy to give a waitress more than a _nickel_. Especially if that waitress looked like Elizabeth Parker… not that she was anything special. She was just attractive. And it was good manners. Annoyed, he glanced at the aforementioned young woman, who evaded his eyes. "_Liz_," he warned.

She sighed, abandoning the coin. Her gaze was shuttered, dark. "Alex never went to Sweden," she blurted.

Michael froze, a fry held immobile halfway to his mouth. "The hell are you talking about? There were pictures and… those postcards…" He pointed the fry at her. "_Explain_."

She frowned. "Keep your voice down."

"I think the table can keep a secret."

Her lips tightened. "_Michael_."

He put the fry back on the plate. "_Liz_."

A brief staring contest ensued. It was irritating how much it took to get her talking; she'd promised to explain her findings and yet, she was still so hesitant to actually tell him anything. What did he have to do to get her to trust him? He was going against Max, his brother, his _King, _to help a girl with entirely too many secrets and a propensity to drive him bat-shit insane at the drop of a hat. It was mindboggling how easily she could aggravate him, _infuriate_ him, with little to no provocation. She was stubborn and a _pain in the ass_, but if he was going to figure out what the fuck was going on—with Alex's death, with Maxwell's strange behavior, with Liz and this weird connection and her irrational mood swings and her lies, her secrets, her secret deal with Kyle, with fucking _everything_ she kept doing—Michael was going to have to keep biting the bullet and deal with her.

He crossed his arms, leaning back in his seat. They'd been getting along so well that afternoon… and she had to go fuck it up by being her usual self. So _annoying_.He was glad that she was in full command of her emotions, at the very least, as he refused to allow her any free reign simply because he had yet to build a resistance to the compelling effect they had on him; Liz felt _way_ too much, _way_ too deeply, and every time she lost control, he found himself too entranced with the mental _pull _to care whether or not they were at odds with each other. _Twice_ now, he'd forfeited an argument in lieu of comforting her, his protective instincts triumphing over his pride. _Not this time._ Michael did not care if baited him with those enormous eyes or—

'_He can be such an ass, sometimes.'_

"_You're _no walk in the park, either," he scoffed out of reflex.

The thunderous silence roared between them, throbbing with anxiety and tension. It rang in his ears, stopped his pulse for precious seconds, drained the blood from her face as dark eyes stared in shock at his own. Michael blanched, watching her face as it mimicked his. Her mouth had not softened its white line of pressure, had not moved to utter a sound, but that was _her_ voice in _his_ head, and unless Parker had taken to ventriloquism—Liz Parker was a scientist, not a fucking comedian—she had just proved another one of his theories correct.

Another staring contest ensued, but this time, pride had nothing to do with it.


	8. The Eighth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE EIGHTH**

He had no idea how long they sat there, staring at each other in the flickering candlelight, but they would have remained thus indefinitely had Isabel Evans not decided to grace them with her presence.

Well, pounding on the door until the occupants snapped out of their daze was not exactly _graceful_. Woe be it to the foolish creature to say otherwise; Michael Guerin was many things, and foolish could be one of those from time to time, but _dead_ was not something he planned on adding to his repertoire. So, _graceful_ it was.

"This discussion is _not_ over," he growled, standing. _Someone_ had to let the princess in.

'_Not like we were actually discussing anything_,' he heard her mutter, the irritation echoing in his mind.

"_Stop that!_" _Fuck, _she pissed him off.

Her eyes widened. He could feel her surprise, her dread, and it pissed him off even more. "You… I can't turn it off, Michael."

He drove a hand through his hair. "Then find a way, damn it. Get the _fuck_ outta there." He could block Maria from getting flashes when they were intimate, but he could not block Liz Parker from talking? To _herself_? _In his head?_ _When they were six feet apart? _What kind of shit was that?

She winced. "I'm not _trying_—"

"Then _not try_ harder!" It was official: she was going to be the death of him.

Knuckles rapped against the glass in an uneven beat, signaling that the princess was impatient. _Girls. _All of them were crazy and _all _of them threatened to drive him insane, starting with Elizabeth Parker. Tossing another glare at the brunette, Michael strode towards the door and yanked it open. He was greeted with a stare as annoyed as his own. "_Finally_," Isabel huffed, pushing past him without as much as a greeting. She flicked her blonde hair over her shoulder. "I offer you a ride home and you leave me standing out there for ten minutes? I have half a mind to…" Isabel trailed off, catching sight of the candles, of the plate with a few cooling fries scattered on top of it, of Liz… Liz, with her dark eyes wide and stricken. Liz, who seemed guilty and afraid at the same time. Liz, who was trembling.

Michael did not know why the sight of Isabel had Parker sitting there, stiff and pale like a deer in headlights, but he did not need her to freak out. Again. "Nice to see you, too," he threw at Isabel, closing and locking the door. '_Chill the fuck out,'_ he directed at Liz, _pushing_ the thought at her; he still did not know the mechanics of this… _situation_… but he was going to take full advantage of it, even if he _had _just yelled at her for doing the same. Albeit, unintentionally.

He knew that Isabel Evans and Elizabeth Parker were not exactly best friends. In fact, they had barely spoken, even after the infamous shooting that had brought the waitress into their circle of secrets. None of that explained why there was this odd tension between the two. Did it have to do with Parker's allegations involving Alex's death? Did it have to do with the alleged betrayal of Maxwell? While close, Isabel and Max led separate lives, and though one would not hesitate to defend the other—other than Max prohibiting her from attending the school she wanted, which was still a sore spot for everyone involved—it hardly called for this kind of animosity. Upon closer inspection, Michael did not find the same doe-eyed fear in Isabel—as if she would actually _show_ it, which was laughable in itself… unless the situation was dire—and, instead, saw cold calculation, surveying the scene like a hawk. "Am I…" The blonde alien turned to give him that same look, like she was trying to figure out an equation. "Am I _interrupting_ something?"

He frowned at her. "Other than dinner? No." What was with her tone? Maria got that same tone when she suspected something, and it was never a good thing for him.

Isabel narrowed her eyes. "Really." She crossed her arms, leaning to one side.

He _hated_ when she did that, so he mimicked her, not daunted in the least. "Yeah, _really_."

'_She thinks… oh, God, she thinks we were…'_ Parker's rambling floated toward him, the disbelief spreading to engulf his cerebrum.

'_She thinks what?'_ He barked at her, hoping she could hear it.

If she did, she gave no indication. Standing, Liz hurriedly walked towards the back room, her antennae wobbling with each step. "I'm gonna… I'm…" She was stuttering. What the hell? "Clothes. Changing." She pushed through the teal door and scampered around the corner towards the lockers. Was he missing something here? That was _not_ normal, and he'd seen Liz pretty fucked up before.

"What was _that_ about?" Isabel demanded, staring after Liz incredulously.

Michael was completely lost. "What was _what_ about?" Damn girls and their damn idiosyncrasies. Why couldn't they just _say_ what they meant?

"_Candles_, Michael?" She did that weird thing with her neck, her face jerking forward in emphasis. "_God_, I can't believe you! First Courtney, now her? _Her_? Maria's not my favorite person, but that's low, even for _you. _This will _crush _her… _God. _Do you know how upset Max will be when he—"

Wait a minute. There was no way she was implying… "Whoa, _what_?" He sputtered indignantly. "You… wha… _Liz?_" It was too ludicrous to put into words.

"So it's _Liz_, now?" Her brows furrowed.

"That's her damn name, isn't it?" He bit out. Was _everyone_ losing their minds? Michael could have sworn that Liz was the unstable one, but he might have to amend that assessment. Maybe she was the normal one, and everyone _else_ was crazy. Himself included, because when he woke up this morning, having this conversation had never appeared on his agenda. _Ever_.

Isabel rolled her eyes and scoffed. "You don't see something wrong with this?" Her voice rose in volume. "Candles, dinner, _alone in the dark_? And you're calling her _Liz_? Since when do you call her _Liz_? It was always Parker, before." She stormed down the aisle to the door Liz had disappeared behind only a few moments ago. "And don't think I haven't noticed you spending so much time with her." He barely managed to stop her, grabbing her arm before she went to attack Parker, who had done nothing to deserve a verbal assault from Isabel Evans. He could not stop her righteous speech, however. "Of _all_ the girls, you pick _that_ one?" She gestured behind her. "The one with the most baggage? _God_, Michael! She slept with Kyle! I thought you were smarter than that."

Michael inhaled deeply, attempting to stay calm. It was not his fault Izzie had gotten a lobotomy today. "You think I'm trying to…" Breathe. Stay calm. "You think I'm trying to put a move on Parker." It was not a question. _Breathe. Calm_. "Because…" _Calm_, damn it. "You saw candles." _Calm_… Isabel raised an eyebrow, pursing her lips. _Screw this_. "What the _fuck _is your problem? The fucking _power went out_ and I was _fucking_ hungry! You have _no idea_ what the _fuck_ you're talking about."

"Language," she admonished out of habit. She flicked her hair again. "And I _do_ know what I'm talking about." Her voice softened a bit. "She hurt Max, and she'll hurt you, too. Stay away from her."

"Kinda hard when I work for her _dad_." He was still annoyed, still indignant and working his way to pissed again. Something was going to explode. He was sure of it.

"Then get another job, if it's going to be a problem." She rubbed at her temples, cringing. "The _last_ thing we need is for you two to bump uglies in the eraser room. _Ugh_."

It was his turn to scoff. "_Please_, Iz. Give me some credit." He ran a hand through his shaggy hair. This would have been highly amusing had she not decided to stubbornly continue down this course. It made him uncomfortable and incredibly awkward, and that made him defensive which, in turn, made him angry. Why did girls jump to conclusions so easily? "I'm not gonna ditch this job just because you got it in your head that I'm doing something with Parker." He was purposely using her last name, something he would have to make an effort from now on, if _this_ was the reaction he received otherwise.

Unbidden, an image of Liz in a sleek black dress, hair curled and dolled up for Prom, sprouted to the forefront of his thoughts; she was a classic beauty, even on her shittiest days, but Elizabeth Parker was _gorgeous _when she put some effort into her appearance. He'd even had a tiny thing for her a long time ago, before he discovered the entertaining Miss DeLuca. _No_. He shook the thought away, his hackles rising in response. Isabel and her damned insinuations were fucking with him. "If I was going to date _anyone_ besides Maria, Parker would _not_ be my first choice," he growled, barely aware of the coffee pot shattering a few feet away. "A quick fuck, _maybe_," he added, smirking, though he found no humor in the situation; Isabel hated crudeness, and he knew just how to get her to back off. Michael was entirely too wound up to care about her _delicate_ sensibilities. "But I don't think there's enough booze in Roswell to make me fuck _that_ thing. She doesn't even have _tits_, Iz, and I'm not even gonna get _started_ on how flat her ass is." Isabel was cringing now. _Perfect_.

Too late, he heard the creak of the teal door. Too late, he was rational enough to remember his volume. _Too fucking late_, he remembered how easily sound carried in this small diner, and that the very girl in discussion was hiding only a few feet away. Footsteps were scurrying away, probably towards the bathroom, where he could not follow.

By the time the red haze had faded, the damage had been done and Isabel, though still skeptical, was a bit more relaxed. Apparently, his ripping Elizabeth Parker to shreds had appeased her enough to stop this pursuit, which had been his intention… but not at this cost. "That was _harsh_, but…" She nodded to herself. "Just don't make the same mistake Max did, Michael." Isabel sighed, walking back to the front of the restaurant. "C'mon. We still have to get my brother before we head home."

Michael was still staring at teal, frozen.

"Michael?" Isabel prodded, snapping him out of it for a moment.

"Just, uh…" He sounded odd, even to himself. "Just wait for me in the car."

Isabel seemed to know exactly what he wanted to do. "Michael, we don't have time for this."

He ground his teeth together. "Just go, Iz."

"_Michael,_" she snapped.

"_Go,_" he snapped back.

Isabel slammed her hands against the entrance of the Crash Down, barreling through. "You have five minutes, Michael, or you're _walking_ home!"

He barely heard her, already striding to where he was sure Liz had hidden herself. He stopped a foot away from the lavatory, the barrier looming before him like the Great Wall. _Shit. _Michael could already feel the bittersweet tendrils of emotion whipping at his psyche, the vibrating sting of her indignation, the stagnant hum of her shock, the sharp tang of her pain burning into him with a vengeance. His nerves were on fire, blazing anew with every swipe of her wounded feelings. It made him queasy. It made him want to comfort her, although that was pretty much pointless, since he was the reason she was in there. He felt like such an _asshole_; not only had he destroyed everything he'd diligently worked to achieve with Liz Parker in one fell swoop, but he'd broken a coffee pot, to boot… because he could not control his temper. Because of Isabel and her damned ideas.

Tentatively, he tried to utilize the connection. '_Liz?'_ The gentle inquiry was slapped away with an incredible amount of vehemence. He nearly staggered from the force exerted. "Liz," he tried aloud, vying for safety in the verbal words. "Liz, look…" How did one even _begin_ to apologize for something like this? With Maria, she would scream and bitch and cry until she was spent, and he could deal with that… but Liz was _hiding_ from him. He could not confront a problem if he could not face it. Michael had never figured her to be a coward, but if he had been in her shoes, he would not want to see his ugly mug either.

Michael sighed. Perhaps if he told her that her breasts were a perfect handful, and that she had a wonderful posterior—paired with fleshy thighs and legs for days—she would feel better.

He really, _really _doubted it.


	9. The Ninth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE NINTH**

"Stop moping, Michael."

"I'm not _moping,_" he countered, stuffing his hand in his jeans. Just because he was moping did not mean that he had to admit it. It was _her_ fault, anyway. Had Isabel not decided to stick her nose where it did not belong, had not riled him up so damn much, he would not have snapped and completely degraded Elizabeth Parker just to defend himself. It was _Isabel's_ fault, _not his_, and that mollified him. A little.

Isabel rolled her eyes and crossed the street towards the UFO Center hovering before them. He followed at a slower pace, glaring at the ground as if it held the answers to all of his problems. Of course, that would be ridiculously helpful, but he did not have that kind of luck, so the gravel beneath his feet just stared back blankly, passive and completely fine with being walked on till the end of time. Like a rug. He sneered at it, kicking it before he finished crossing the street. Lifeless things could not feel and thus, would not be offended or hurt if he stomped on it. Living organisms—humans, specifically, and even some _half-_humans—did not have that luxury; they laughed at something humorous, they cried in sorrow, and when some douchebag-asshole-jerkface said they were completely unfuckable by any means necessary, they got pissed and went to hide in a bathroom, where said douchebag-asshole-piece of shit could do nothing but shiver in the wake of their tangible pain.

Michael knew he would obsess about this all fucking night. It was _already_ gnawing at him, and it had not been more than ten minutes since he'd walked away from that bathroom door. Why had he not thought to bring his bike today? He'd decided to save gas by tagging along with the Evans siblings for school, and since Max also had to work afterwards, Isabel had offered to give them a ride home after shopping. While he was glad Isabel was trying to get her mind off of Maxwell's recent power-trip, Michael suddenly wished she had not been in such a good mood to give him a lift. If his motorcycle were here, he could have stayed at the Crash to fix things with Liz… if they _could_ be fixed.

He felt like such an _asshole_. There was so much emphasis on the "asshole", that he would need every human on Earth to scream it at the top of their lungs before he got his point across.

A part of him wanted to pretend he did not care. And he shouldn't. She was just _Liz_, after all. No one special. No one important. So what if he did not find her attractive—a lie—or fuckable—another lie—or girlfriend material—a… well, he was not sure if that was a lie or not, but for the sake of his conscience, he would just abstain from thinking about it. Logically, Michael's opinion about Elizabeth Parker should not matter in the slightest. He was dating Maria—most of the time—and she used to date his brother, until she had decided to make them all believe she'd slept with Kyle to break up with Max—he still needed an explanation for that. Before the death of Alex Whitman, Michael had been fairly certain that those two would get over their squabble, as Liz had obviously not gotten over their alien King, but with the revelation that she had not actually betrayed Maxwell, Michael was no longer sure. So, if she was ready to move on from her _soul mate_, and Michael was nothing more than a friend, why did his callous words have such an effect? It was not as if she…

Damn Isabel and her _damned _accusations and her _damned_ tendency to jump to conclusions. She was putting thoughts in his head. Weird, unimaginable thoughts that he dared not breathe life into, lest they completely overwhelm him. This was _Liz Parker, _not some stupid teenage drama sitcom bullshit. Elaborate hoaxes and self-esteem issues aside, Liz was an intelligent young woman, but a _woman _nonetheless, and there was not a female alive who would not feel some degree of hurt over his words. He was looking too much into the details, that was all. Obsessing, actually. And if he did not at least _try_ to rectify this, he would never get any sleep tonight.

"Iz," he called before the blonde could disappear within the building. "I'll be right back."

"_Michael_," she warned in that maternal edge he hated so much.

"Don't, Iz." He glared fiercely. If she didn't like it, too fucking bad. This was _her_ fault to begin with. "You get Maxwell. _I'll _be right back." He turned to the Crash Down, his feet running of their own volition.

Michael never knew what to say to her when it mattered, and that still held true, but he had school and both jobs to contend with tomorrow, and he'd be royally screwed if he didn't get a few hours of shut-eye. He was going to swallow his pride, apologize to her, hope like hell that she accepted it, and then hop in the damned jeep with the Evans siblings to head home for a night of junk food and carbonated beverages in front of his television before he succumbed to slumber. The nagging guilt would be abated, however slightly, and he could perform his daily routine with little to no problems… and perhaps figure out what Liz had discovered in her investigation, or even try to understand the connection that they could not bring themselves to speak of. Probably wishful thinking, as he would be lucky if she could bring herself to forgive him, but nothing aggravated him more than being left in the dark—except _her_—and if _anyone_ could be the light that shone some clarity in this muck, it would be Liz Parker.

For once in his life, his timing was absolutely _perfect_; as he ran through the back room door, Liz emerged from the bathroom, her eyes red but dry. She froze when she saw him, though she did not scurry back into her sanctuary like he thought she might, and he was glad that she'd found her backbone. Her emotions were in check and she raised her chin a notch, standing her ground admirably.

He almost smiled. "Liz," he said in a rush. "I'm sor—"

She held up a hand, her composure intact. This was not the automaton, just Liz Parker, calm, poised and mature enough—after a bout of tears, no doubt—to handle it. "There's nothing to apologize for, Michael." Her hand dropped, her dark eyes staring boldly into his. "I'm an adult. Granted, I'll be the first to admit that I've never taken criticism very well, and your particular…" Her prepared speech faltered, he saw, and he allowed her a second to reclaim her momentum. "Um, _eloquence _leaves much to be desired, but that's not to say that you're not entitled to your own opinion." He opened his mouth to correct her. She silenced him, continuing in that infuriatingly reasonable voice of hers. "I don't appreciate what you said, in fact, I think that was the most derogatory remark I've ever heard towards my person." Guilt bled into frustration. He hated when she adopted that lofty, haughty tone that reminded him of a snobby child. Even if he deserved it, that stupid tone grated on his nerves. "However, I'm willing to disregard your behavior if you're willing to disregard mine."

His irritation dissipated. Michael nearly asked her to repeat herself. He scratched the back of his neck, uncertain as to how he should go about this. "Thanks for letting me off the hook, I guess." A pause. "But, uh… why?" It felt strange to receive forgiveness so easily, without groveling or muttering a thousand apologies. _Too _easy. There had to be a catch somewhere.

She frowned. "Why what?"

"Just… why?" He hated explaining himself. "What did _you_ do? I mean, I know I was a dick, but…" He narrowed his eyes at her. "How come you're making this so easy?"

She rolled her eyes at him. He was getting sick of people doing that. "Forget it, okay? No harm, no foul."

Michael remembered the bite of her emotions, thick and aching through that door when she refused to hear him. He remembered the rough recoil when he had attempted to reach her mentally, and the acidic burn with every step he took, until he felt like he'd been eaten alive as he placed a hand on the cool wood that separated them. She had taken it pretty hard. Yet, here she was, acting like it had not meant a thing. "Bullshit," he declared, crossing his arms.

"You're paranoid," she countered, imitating his stance. She was trying to dismiss him.

"Nothing new," he said, still eying her with suspicion. "Spit it out, Parker."

She flinched, a small twitch, but he had no idea why. "So we're back to _Parker_," he heard her mutter, her gaze dropping to the floor. She regained her footing and met his glare, collected once more. "Back off, Michael."

That old trick? One would think she had learned her lesson by now. "That shit doesn't work on me. Try again."

"_Michael_."

Did _every_ female read from the same book or something? They had to, because there was no way they could all say his name, in that same voice, with that same infliction that turned his name into a sigh of exasperation, without there being some kind of universal Bible of Estrogen that was passed around. Were there meetings? Did they have some kind of secret handshake? Or did they just sit around in a circle, perfecting the many ways to drive a man insane in two seconds flat? "Liz," he growled. "We've been over this. For _fuck's _sake, quit beating around the fucking bush and just _tell _me."

Her frown deepened, the first signs of anger tightening her jaw. "There's _nothing_ to tell. _God_, you're stubborn." She threw her hands up, driving one through her mass of dark hair. "_Fine!_ You hurt my ego. _Happy_? Yeah, it made me feel bad, but then I remembered that I wouldn't want to _fuck you either_, and I got over it." She snorted at him. "I thought you weren't into all this touchy-feely crap."

It still surprised him whenever she swore. Perhaps he had rubbed off on her, for he could see no other reason why she would suddenly develop that nasty habit—usually when arguing with _him_—and yet, he was starting to accept it. Somewhat. It just did not sound right coming from her, but he could have dealt with it. True, it always made him hesitate and run over her words a few times in his head, as if his mind needed time to process, but he could have _dealt_ with it. What he could _not_ deal with, process and accept was Liz Parker having the gall to say that she would not fuck him. Male pride? Sure. Michael would not deny that, not in the least. He had never been intentionally narcissistic or exceptionally vain, but he knew that he wasn't bad looking; there were more than a few girls in school that would have allowed him to satiate some teenage hormones in the eraser room. Before Maria, he had been single by choice, unwilling to deal with the complications.

What a load of shit. Elizabeth Parker was telling him that she would not want to… it was ridiculous. He was offended. He was indignant. Above all, he was amused.

So he laughed.

She was trying to hurt _his _ego. It was painfully obvious that she was lying, and if she was not, he planned to call her on it in every way possible, until she was beet-red from embarrassment. This could be fun, teasing her. Little Miss Scientist had no idea who she was messing with and he parted his grinning lips to inform her of the shit she had just gotten herself into, when the loud crack of a gunshot shattered his mischievous mood. His smile ironed out. Liz, he noted, had gone still and pale, her attitude forgotten. The game would have to wait.

That shot had come from the UFO Center.


	10. The Tenth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE TENTH**

Of all the possible hazards that came with being an alien in Roswell, New Mexico, _this_ had never been factored in as a possibility.

Brody Davis, a self-made millionaire and the owner of the UFO Center in which Maxwell Evans worked, had always been one of those kooky conspiracy theorists. The difference between him and the other tourists was the fact that Brody had the money and technology to investigate his leads and, somehow, had gotten a hold of a few alien trinkets along the way; another startling difference was the fact that, as Brody often suspected but did not actually know for certain, he had been used as a vessel for extraterrestrials—specifically, one named Larek—to communicate with the Royal Four and their duplicates whenever the need arose.

None of this explained why he was holding people hostage at gunpoint. Not just _any _people, either. Among the detained were Isabel and Maxwell Evans, the pregnant Tess Harding, and Sean, Amy and Maria Deluca.

Michael had never been a fan of Brody Davis, not when it was obvious that Brody had some kind of thing for Maria. It bugged him whenever Maria flirted with the guy for tips, or took the time to sit down and talk to him with the calm and patience she never exercised with Michael. Maria was sweet and sympathetic and he knew better than to let jealousy blind him, but as Michael stood on the Parker balcony with Kyle and the former Sheriff Valenti while they outfitted Elizabeth Parker with a camera and microphone, Michael swore that he would never allow Maria to be alone with Brody damn Davis. _Ever_.

He was not happy about this whole scheme Jim Valenti had cooked up, either. When Brody had demanded food for his hostages, Jim had taken it upon himself to play negotiator before the Roswell Police Department caught wind of the situation. In a few moments, Michael would have to use his abilities to make seven burgers and seven orders of fries, which Liz, now back in her uniform, would deliver. One of her antennae had a microphone hidden behind the wobbling bulb at the end, and the camera was placed on the band between the stems of her headpiece. Her dark tresses cascaded freely down her back and were tousled slightly for extra volume, which concealed the small electronic device at the crown of her head. For the final addition to her wardrobe, young Miss Parker was given a small handgun to hide in her brassier and a brief tutorial on how to aim between the crosshairs. "Make sure you turn the safety off," Jim was instructing, demonstrating the difference between the tiny red and white dots. "You might not have the time to check it, so I'm going to turn it on for now. Remember: safety and hammer before you aim. No major arteries," he added as an afterthought.

Liz was handling it admirably, though she barely possessed the strength to pull back the hammer of the gun. She would need both hands and that would hinder her greatly, but Valenti had an enormous amount of confidence in the teenage girl. Michael wanted to smack some sense into Jim; just because his powers did not seem to work in radius of the UFO Center, did _not_ mean that they had to send in _Liz Parker_. She was just a waitress, _damn it!_ They were giving her a gun and dressing her as if she was a trained agent, but she was just a science geek that went to West Roswell High. Was he the only one who thought that there was something wrong here?

Michael was in the kitchen, finishing up the large order, when the three of them came downstairs. Liz was donning her coat, muttering the steps in operating the firearm beneath her breath, like she was studying for a test. Michael ground his teeth together. This pop quiz could get her killed, and aside from the nervous twitch in her fingers, she was taking it in stride.

"Parker," Michael said, putting the food in a box. Kyle and his father were waiting in the dining room quietly. "I don't know if I can… you know, keep tabs on you in there."

She nodded, her eyes downcast. "I know. Your powers don't work in there." She fiddled with a napkin. "It would explain why the others can't get out. I just don't understand how Brody neutralized their powers. Do you think it's Larek?"

He shook his head. "No fucking idea." He willed her to look at him. "_Liz_," he stressed, and was rewarded with her gaze meeting his. "You _have_ to be careful. Max can't heal you if something goes wrong."

A small smile graced her face, strained but sincere. "Don't worry, this _will_ work. I'll go in, get them out and Brody will never suspect a thing."

He was not fooled by her feigned confidence. "I still don't like it," he grumbled.

"I'll bring them back, Michael. I _promise_." She was dead serious, and that was the problem.

They stared at each other, silent. This was a bad situation and everyone involved was in grave danger. Everything rested on the tiny shoulders of one little waitress who willingly took the burden, doing her best to pretend that she was not afraid. What if Brody shot her? The thought alone made his stomach churn in distaste; she'd been shot once before and had nearly died because of it. This time, there was no way to help her if Valenti's shitty plan went awry and Michael did not know if he could willingly let another one of their group face potential death when he could have prevented it. _He_ should be going in there, not her. Even if his powers were useless, it should be him, Michael Guerin… but Bitch Brody somehow knew who was an alien, and that was why they'd chosen Liz to begin with.

Filled with anxiety and dread, he found himself blurting, "I think you have a nice ass."

Aw, fuck. Her face flared fourteen different shades of red. When she tucked her hair behind her ears, he could see the tips of cartilage burning hotly. "Um…" She started to smile again, unable to help herself. "Thanks, I think." A giggle burst free, shaking with nerves but full of mirth. "I think you do, too."

Michael smirked. "Thought so."

The light atmosphere was shattered when Jim came back to check on them. His eyes fell on the box of food. "C'mon, Liz. We don't have much time." His face and voice were grave.

Michael wanted to walk her to the UFO Center, but he knew that would not fly. He tried really hard not to think of this as the last time he would see her, alive and well, and managed a tight smile when she cast him one last glance before pushing through the Crash Down's door. He watched her long blanket of hair flutter like a black flag and damned this stupid plan again. Everything screamed at him to follow her, to throw her back into the safety of the restaurant, but he controlled the impulse and turned, instead, to the flight of stairs that would lead him up to Parker's private veranda. From there, they would watch and listen to whatever the tiny camera and microphone picked up from the inside of the UFO Center, and act accordingly. Worst case scenario, they knew what they were dealing with should Liz fail.

'_Liz,_' he tried, sending the thought through their mental channel. He got nothing in response, and his anxiety skyrocketed.

Through the small monitor, they could hear her breathing, slow at first and then picking up in speed once she rounded a corner. She encountered a haphazard barrier at the steps leading to the large room where Max and Tess were sitting on the floor, the only ones that were bound. Isabel sat beside them, leaning on her brother, with Maria and her mother a few paces away. Sean was sitting in a chair, staring at something off camera. None of them were harmed. All occupants, including Brody, looked up at the waitress, wearing various expressions of surprise, hope and, on Tess in particular, disappointment.

"Here," Brody was saying in his distinctive accent. "Lemme help you through tha'." Oh, _now_ the jackass wanted to be helpful? "Wotch ya head there."

Once Liz was through the barricade of scattered furniture, the camera got an eyeful of Davis and Michael cursed Parker's lack of height. He did _not_ want that face taking up the entire screen. "Seven burgers and seven fries," Liz confirmed, her voice unnaturally high. _Keep it together_, he advised, knowing that she would not hear him. Brody took a burger and handed the rest of the package to Maria, who began distributing the goods. The bastard even paid Liz, telling her to keep the change.

Brody bit into his meal and frowned. "Is there a new cook at the Crash Down?" He asked, chewing thoughtfully.

Michael's heart was in his throat. Something was off. "E-excuse me?" Parker's voice was unsteady, clearly surprised.

"These burgas," Brody said, gesturing. "They jus' taste diff'rent."

Liz stammered. "Oh! Well, you know, there's no power over there either so, uh, we had to use this little butane grill." Thank every deity in existence, even Kyle's beloved Buddha, for Elizabeth Parker. That girl was brilliant. Absolutely _fucking_ brilliant.

Unfortunately, so was Brody. "So how did you cook the fries?"

Michael hoped that Liz would use her intellect to evade the question, but she hesitated.

It was enough to ruin everything.

"The same way," she finally croaked.

_Fuck_. That was the wrong answer. On the screen, the gunman grabbed her by the neck, hauling her towards the rest of the hostages. He waved the barrel of his firearm in her face, yelling at her, accusing her of using alien powers, calling her "one of them". She did not struggle and allowed him to throw her on the floor, where her antennae headpiece slipped off and slid away. The little camera faced the ceiling, completely useless. There was shuffling and Max's voice was heard arguing with Brody to let her go, and then the camera moved again, revealing a haggard Liz trying to pull the gun out of her brassiere, tearing open her uniform in the process. "Safety, hammer, aim," she whispered to herself, handing the headpiece to Maria.

For one, agonizing moment, the monitor focused on the gun in Parker's small hands. Michael, who was not very familiar with weapons, had been present while Valenti drilled the basics of handling one… but the pressure of the circumstances must have distracted the old Sheriff long enough to forget that he'd toyed with the safety one time too many. When Liz Parker thought she had clicked the safety off, the white dot proved that she'd turned it _on_.

"Drop it!" Liz commanded, her voice strong in spite of her obvious unease. She held the gun like a professional, but it was pointless when it would not fire.

"_No!_" Max roared, throwing himself at, of _all_ people, Brody.

Michael could only stare in horror, unable to comprehend what would cause his brother to lose all semblance of sanity. The party was just getting started, they would discover, when an unbalanced Brody reflexively pulled the trigger. No one could see the trail of the small projectile as it sped through the air, but there was not a doubt as to where it lodged itself once Liz Parker staggered back and fell, instantly limp.

There was a cacophony of screams ringing through the microphone, chaos erupting on both sides of the monitor. Michael leapt from the balcony as déjà vu overwhelmed him, landing swiftly on his feet, completely deaf to the shouts of the two Valenti men; he was running, reacting on instinct, unable to think clearly. Everything that could have gone wrong, _had_ gone wrong, and he had to get to Liz. He should have never let her go in there alone, should have never let her go _period_.

Goddamn Max and his sudden irrational behavior. Damn Valenti and this _stupid fucking _plan, damn Brody and his stupid _bullshit fucking_ conspiracies and who the fuck held up a bunch of humans because he was convinced aliens existed? Once he was sure that Liz would survive—and she would… she had _fucking_ better, or he'd kick her ass—Michael was going show Dickhead Davis just how smart it was to piss off an Antarian royal. That son of a bitch was going to wish he had never _heard_ of UFOs, let alone researched them.

'_Liz,'_ he was chanting over and over, projecting the cry as loud as possible. _'Liz! Liz, Liz, Liz, LizLizLizLizLiz…'_ He burst through the door of the UFO Center, still shouting her name in his mind. Adrenaline gave him extra agility and he leapt over the barricade, paying no heed to the struggling Sean, who was wrestling the gun out of Brody's hands, or to the howling Max, or the hysterical DeLuca women, or Isabel, who was looking around with something akin to desperation, or to Tess, who was trying to calm down her lover. He shouldered past them all, kneeling by an unconscious brunette with her uniform torn wide open.

There was blood. _So much blood_. More than he'd ever seen before, pooling in the dip of her navel, sliding off her abdomen, staining the fabric of her clothes. The entrance wound was concealed by the thick, dark liquid. "_Michael!_" Maria cried, tears streaming down her cheeks. "She won't wake up, and Max can't…" she choked on a harsh sob. He knew all of that already. Michael could not heal like Maxwell, could not fix this, but Max was hindered by the containment field.

His throat was tightening. _'Liz_,' he tried once more, _pushing_ the link as wide as it could go. No longer did he give a shit if she could see all of his dark secrets; he just needed her to _wake the fuck_ up. He'd deal with the fall out later, he'd deal with the questions and uncomfortable interrogations and the bullshit and all of her dissecting stares, if she would just open those big brown eyes of hers and look at him.

'_Liz, goddamn it.'_

Michael reached for her face, trying to force her eyelids open. She was not dead yet—the eyelids slid open halfway in death, as the muscles relaxed before rigor mortis set in—but she was well on her way. _'Liz, it's too fucking early for you to see Alex, so you get your ass back here. I can't deal with Maria by myself, she'll fucking drive me insane without you.' _He was floundering, pulling on every excuse in the book. Distantly, he heard Brody demand something. The dumbass had gotten a hold on his weapon again, but that hardly mattered. _'Open your goddamned eyes!' _Another push without a response. He kept nudging her, searching for any sign of brain activity, any sign of life in that complicated head of hers. When he found a fluttering spark, he made a desperate grab with everything he could muster, pulling on it with invisible hands until his vision grew blurry.

Whatever had neutralized their powers could not stop him from wrenching Elizabeth Parker back to life, even if it took his own. As he lost consciousness, Michael had the fleeting notion that it just might.


	11. The Eleventh

_Cry Your Name_

**THE ELEVENTH**

"I found it!" That sounded like Isabel.

"Destroy it before Brody wakes up." Max. Definitely Max.

"Oh, _God!_ Is she gonna be okay? What about Michael? What happened to him?" A loud sniffle. Maria, most likely. "Max, hurry! She's so _cold_…"

"I can't break it!" Isabel.

"Use the gun." Max.

"I don't know _how_ to use a gun!"

"What the hell are you people talking about?" It was Sean, incredulous. "Liz is _dying_ and you're worried about some stupid toy?"

"Tess, use your mind warp once we break that thing," Max grumbled.

A gunshot echoed, followed by the sound of plastic breaking. "I got it!" Isabel, triumphant.

"_Max!_" Maria, completely hysterical now. "They're not breathing! I can't get a pulse and—"

At long last, he regained use of his motor skills. _He_ was going to shoot someone if he had to listen to them for one more second. "_Fuck_, will you people stop _yelling?_" His ears were still ringing from their volume. Thankfully, he was rewarded with wonderful silence. _Good_. It was about damned time they listened to him. With a groan, Michael tried to sit up, ignoring the fierce burn in his stomach; it felt like he'd been run over with a semi, and then the driver had hit reverse. What had happened during his blackout? Had Brody decided to shoot _him_, too? He forced his limbs to cooperate.

"_Liz?_" Maria stared at him, her eyes round. Behind her, the others mimicked her surprise, gaping at him.

He ignored them. "How is she?" The ringing in his ears had yet to stop, but his voice seemed off, even above the dull roar. No one answered him, and he feared the worst. "She's not… she didn't…" He could not say it.

Maria squinted at him, leaning closer. "No way… _Michael?_"

Irritation tampered down the weight of guilt. He frowned at her. "What?" Why were they looking at him like that? Now was not the time to gawk. They should have been attending to Parker.

"Michael?" Maxwell Evans decided it was time to talk. "It can't be… how is this possible?"

Tess Harding—who was still _pregnant_, goddamn it—crept closer to Max, fixated on Michael. "He… he must have transferred his essence over to Liz… but he would have to…" She frowned. "There's no way; that thing made our powers useless, and Liz isn't one of us, so even if he did have some kind of _kali_ with her, it shouldn't…" To his mounting aggravation, Michael watched as Tess got that faraway look in her eyes; the same expression Liz Parker always wore when she was trying to figure something out that stumped her.

What the fuck were they doing? What the _fuck_ were they talking about? What the fuck was a… whatever the fuck that word was? This was one hell of a situation, with a person's _life _at stake, and all they could do was sit there and stare at him with their thumbs in their asses. They might as well bust out the s'mores and start singing _Kumbaya_ in this circle-jerk of freak-shows.

Michael glared at them, raising his hand to swipe at a dark tendril of hair that had fallen before his nose… and froze. His eyes grew large as he inspected the blood that covered his skin, his soft, tanned, _feminine_ hand. A glance south revealed the blood-splattered canvas of his—_her—_stomach, the teal uniform ripped open to exhibit the damage done to Elizabeth Parker's tiny form.

His small hands clamped onto the mounds that now adorned his torso, moving of their own accord; it was a male's natural reaction to the revelation of full, round breasts suddenly nearly bare and within reach. "I have _boobs?_" He wondered aloud in Parker's vocals. That, among other things, had him in a state of total paralysis. So _this_ was why the others were so entranced, completely unable to look away—well, not that a mostly-nude young woman soaked in blood wouldn't have rendered them immobile otherwise, but the very fact that Liz Parker's body was not only moving, it had another occupant: _him_.

This time, Maxwell was the voice of reason. For once. "We can figure this out later. I need you to get out of there, Michael." His voice was hard.

Did he not approve of Michael touching Parker's rack? Because, _technically_, it was not necessarily _Michael_ holding them… "This doesn't come with a fucking manual, Maxwell. I don't even know how I got _in_ here."

Max glared. "I need to connect with Liz. _You're_ not Liz."

"No shit." Why were they still talking? "Just do it."

"I need to—"

"Liz isn't _here_," Michael growled, sick of this game. "You're gonna have to improvise."

Reluctantly, Maxwell agreed that Elizabeth Parker's life was a bit more important than their squabble, and the alien King tentatively placed his palm on the crimson-stained navel. Upon skin to skin contact vermillion lightning, not unlike blood, cackled angrily beneath tanned flesh, engulfing Liz entirely in its voracious current. Michael, the inhabitant, hissed as fire danced within his—_her—_veins, burning him unlike anything he'd ever experienced before. It was enough for him to release the breasts in his custody. "_Fuck_." He twitched in erratic spasms, his nerves screaming from the onslaught while wave after wave of electricity threatened to consume him inch by agonizing inch. Max immediately retracted his appendages, but Michael would not allow that. "No… just…" he bit out, panting. "Just _do_ it."

Michael instantly regretted it.

He was thrown from his current form, ingloriously torn from the shell of Elizabeth Parker and stuffed into the same body he'd known his entire life. Fully cognitive, the experience felt akin to being split apart, molecule by painful molecule, without the ability to scream or cry from the anguish. How had he entered Liz in the first place? Michael vowed that he would sooner die than ever willingly go through that again.

Liz seemed to share his sentiments; when Michael gasped into awareness, dizzy and shaky as all hell, Liz greeted her revitalization with an unholy screech that vibrated within the foundation of the building. As one, they shirked away from the small waitress as she writhed in jerky movements, her back arching off of the floor, her arms twisting in odd and unnatural angles, the jagged red tendrils crawling over her skin in a sadistic caress. This was not something he remembered from the first time Maxwell had saved Parker's life, and that meant something was significantly different this time around.

Did this have to do with his unintentional invasion? Nothing had happened until Max touched her, so was it some kind of reaction to aliens? Though, again, nothing had occurred with Michael… _damn it_, what the _fuck_ was going on?

"Guys," Tess intoned, shouting over the screams. "Hurry up. I can't keep the warp going for much longer."

Isabel was still staring at Liz in horror. "But I broke that… that… that _thing_."

Tess shook her head. "My powers are fading… because…" She gasped. "_Guys!_ Now would be a good time!"

_Shit_. He was willing to bet that her powers were fading because of her pregnancy. _Another _reason to chew Max out once this was over.

A sizzling cloud of agony jolted him from his bitter train of thought, bringing his attention back to the owner of that particular sensation. Michael tore off his shirt and threw it over Liz; if they had to get out of here, they had to do it quick and without attracting too much attention. Since Max could not touch her without that red crap hurting both of them, Michael took it upon himself to grab her—they could deal with this issue once the problem of Brody, Amy and Sean DeLuca were taken care of—and carried the twitching brunette towards the pile of furniture. "_C'mon_," he called over to the others, his voice dark with urgency. It was difficult to concentrate with Parker still crying out, whimpers occasionally breaking through, and he bit back an oath. That red shit was fizzling out a little, gradually morphing into sparkling emerald, and her volume was not nearly as high as before, but she _had_ to stay quiet until they could help her. He could barely walk straight with her screaming both mentally _and_ verbally.

'_Liz, you can bitch all you want later, but I need you to shut the _fuck_ up right now.'_ He peered at her contorted features, forcing calm into his next projection. _'Please.'_

Miraculously, she heard him. She must have, because she bit down on her lip, stifling anything other than the occasional murmur of discomfort in the back of her throat. _'Good girl.'_ Shouldering past the fumbling barricade, he left them to clean up their mess—well, _Brody's_ mess—with Elizabeth Parker tense in his arms, drowning in a shirt that was entirely too big for her. He was met with two frazzled Valenti's at the top of the steps, who had obviously witnessed the whole ordeal, but did not badger him with a thousand questions; instead, they opened the doors for him and kept vigil while Michael snuck back into the Crash Down, rushing towards the staircase that led to the apartment above. He had no idea where the Parkers went when they left Liz alone to manage the restaurant, but he was glad they were nowhere in sight. If they knew what their daughter got into when they were not around…

"Is she all right?" Kyle breathed once they were safely within Parker's room.

Michael shook his head, clearing away the unorganized piles of paper to place Liz on her bed. She was shivering, but no longer riddled with those strange currents, or holding back those awful screams. She, in fact, seemed quiet peaceful, if a little cold. Thankfully, that blanket of disorienting anguish had dissipated. "I'm not sure," he replied, his brow furrowed. That shirt was ruined beyond all repair and if he ever got it back, he doubted he would wear it again.

Jim Valenti stared at the small girl for a moment, his face aging more by the second. With a small sigh, he turned to leave them. "I'm gonna go check on the others. Will you two be okay for a little while?"

Kyle nodded. "Yeah…" He glanced at Michael. "Yeah, we'll be fine, dad."

The senior Valenti followed his son's eyes. "Michael," Jim called.

"Hmm?" He was distracted and tense and relieved and a million things at the same time.

"Ya did good, kid." Jim left, closing the door softly behind him.

A moment of silence passed. There were words to be said, questions to be asked, and the weight was unbearable enough that Michael sagged to the hardwood floor, leaning against a side of the mattress. He leaned his head back, staring at the ceiling, barely aware of Kyle mimicking his position, sitting to his left. Neither spoke, lost in their own thoughts, attempting to piece together the tumultuous events that had taken place in the UFO Center. Trying to figure out what had happened, _why_ it had happened, and what it all meant. How did one begin to comprehend what their eyes had witnessed tonight? As the adrenaline ebbed from his body, Michael realized that he'd started shaking. If Kyle noticed, he did not comment.

_Fuck._ Didn't aliens get some kind of paid vacation from this crazy shit?


	12. The Twelfth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE TWELFTH**

There were words exchanged, quiet and secretive. The whirring _click_ of an old camera.

"You sure? He's still snoring."

"Trust me. I know he is."

"That's… that's really, _really_ weird, Liz."

"Tell me about it."

He grumbled beneath his breath. All of their babbling had kept him from trying to smother himself in the comfortable blanket of slumber, and he was irritatingly awake. The best nap in a long, _long_ time, and those two chatterboxes had completely screwed it up. Admittedly, the snippet of conversation was intriguing enough to toy with the idea of feigning sleep for a little longer, but Liz somehow knew that he was conscious enough for coherency, and so _that_ plan flew out of the window.

With a scowl, Michael rubbed at his eyes and yawned like a bear, confused by the soft bed beneath him; the last he remembered, he was sitting on the floor, trying to quell the inexplicable trembling in his limbs. How had they lugged him onto the mattress? Sure, Kyle used to play football and basketball, but midgets did not have that kind of strength, right?

"Morning, sunshine," Kyle chirped.

Michael froze at the light touch on his bare stomach. Liz still had his shirt. Bleary eyes looked to see Kyle trailing his fingers down Michael's abdomen, tracing the indent of each muscle. "What the _fuck_ are you doing?" The growl was low and husky from sleep, but in no way did it convey a shred of humor. He smacked away the playful hand.

Liz, dressed in a small tank top and matching shorts, giggled shamelessly. Looking at her, one would never have guessed that she'd been shot twice in her short life. "Danger, Will Robinson! _Danger!_"

Confused and alarmed, Michael sat up and away from the two humans, glaring. He scoffed. "Sorry, I'm not into ewoks."

"Or girls," Kyle quipped, grinning.

"_Girlfriend_, remember? What, does Maria not count anymore?" What was with these two?

Liz cackled, holding up a square photograph. "Poor Maria. What _will_ she say when she finds out you've been cheating on her?"

"The fuck?" Michael, aggravated, snatched the Polaroid and narrowed his eyes at the scene depicted; Kyle was lying on his side, entirely too close for comfort, while he coyly pinched one of Michael's nipples. He was smiling down at the blond alien with some sick and twisted semblance of affection. The photograph burst into flames in his grasp. "You're so dead, Valenti."

"If you do that," warned Parker in a strange sing-song, "I'll have to distribute the rest of these to the entire student body. Roswell's an _awfully_ small town, Michael."

Was she… was she _blackmailing_ him?

It was a three-way stand-off on Elizabeth Parker's bed, with Kyle lounging on his back between them sporting an impish grin, and Liz sitting with her legs crossed, leaning back on her hands in a disturbingly comfortable position. Michael bristled at the humans; what the hell had gotten into them? What the _fuck_ had he done to deserve this? Why would Kyle willingly jeopardize his reputation just to play accomplice to Parker's ridiculous little game? They were having fun at his expense, and while a part of him was infinitely glad that she was healthy and whole after the fiasco at the UFO Center, another part wished to grab her by her hair and _demand_ where the remainder of those photographs were.

_'Hell hath no fury, Michael_,_'_ her teasing whisper fluttered through his head.

The revelation did nothing to alleviate his annoyance with her. This was about what she'd overheard him say to Isabel? He'd already admitted that he thought she was attractive—that she _had a nice ass_, specifically—so what was the point? And why bring _Kyle_ into the mix? There was not a single scrap of logic behind this strategy and he could not seem to find a reason, regardless of what perspective he tried, so he tore through their connected channel and dove into her mind, uncaring of how she would react to the sudden invasion, or that, if she tried, she could see into him just as clearly.

It was easy. _Much _too easy. Where once he could only glean the surface if he concentrated hard enough, he could now swim in the colorful waters of Elizabeth Parker with barely a thought. The ease of passage left him a little disoriented, but he barreled onward.

Humor was the first he encountered, a thin layer of shining emerald, and it left a faint trail of shimmering laughter in its wake, warming his insides. In spite of its exuberance, it was brittle and opaque, covering the murky lake of her emotions with a weak sheen of viridescence. Further within, the colors darkened until they were a singular, black mass, muddled with spots of sickly yellow. Icy fingers left a physical chill against his skin the deeper he settled into her psyche; there was a small grudge she held against Michael, he saw, about how callously he'd dismissed her in front of Isabel Evans, but even that small malice she reserved for him flickered with rich blues of sadness and the occasional glittering amber of… well, he did not know what that meant. The amber felt cozy and _right_, like winter nights by a roaring fire, or a home-cooked meal, or buying a brand new motorcycle and driving it around the desert with the wind whipping through his hair.

Michael delved deeper, pushing aside the odd feeling and venturing on. Jealousy, anger, hatred and a sorrow so deep, he could drown himself if he allowed the emotion to overwhelm him, pulsated in tandem with his racing heart. He had to tamper down the instinctive need to raise his defenses, backing away from that particular ball of woe, and selected another tangle to sort through before he risked going for that ebony mass of pain.

There was fear, a blinding fear that numbed his senses and froze his limbs, lurking around, tied to the memory of the UFO Center. He'd known that she was not as calm and stable as she appeared when Valenti had handed her that firearm, had known that she could not have shouldered that much responsibility without a smidgeon of trepidation, but he had not expected to encounter such a stark terror that constricted his lungs. In retrospect, he should have known better; she'd been _shot_ before, had nearly _died_ before, so holding the very instrument that had caused such pain would undoubtedly inspire such a strong reaction. She'd wanted to run far away from the gun, wanted to cry from the phantom wound she could still feel at times. A protective rush of anger threatened to pull him out of the web of her mind, ready to throttle Jim Valenti for being so _fucking_ stupid, but he kept his wayward emotion in check, saving it for when he saw that idiotic old man.

His next adversary loomed before him, thick and darker than pitch. It was fucking _huge_, dwarfing all others, consuming her little by little. Too many memories, too many emotions. It made him dizzy and nauseous and he flinched away from the cold touch of that _thing_. What the hell _was_ that, and why was it in Parker's head? Gritting his teeth, he reached for it, determined to tear that cocoon apart to get to the bottom of this, when a flash, unbidden, surged forward, distracting him… and he knew, instantly, why she'd become so preoccupied with this silly little game of hers.

_Shit_.

Michael Guerin never claimed to know a girl's heart, never claimed to know how to deal with them, or what to say to them. He didn't always know how fix the problems they faced, or the plethora of emotions they threw themselves into, but even _he_ knew devastation when he saw it—_felt _it. He was skimming the surface of this gunky wasteland her mind had become, but that image was enough to answer a few things. It was enough to indulge her in this little distraction for however long she needed to cope.

_'Liz…'_ he tried, slowly retreating into the sanctuary of his own head. _'I'm sorry…'_

The smile on her face was strained, but she was forcing herself to retain it. _'Don't, Michael. Just… don't, okay?'_

What could he say to that? Maxwell Evans had made a lot of mistakes these past few weeks, but none more horrible than this last one; when Max had connected to Liz to heal her the first time, he'd taken flashes from her childhood. This time, it was Liz that stole a few fragments from him… and now, not only did she have firsthand knowledge of what Tess Harding looked like naked, but she was fully aware that Maxwell and his former alien wife were expecting a child. And yet, there was still a shadowed fragment of Elizabeth Parker that could not help her love for the alien King. Michael had seen it, had felt it, and he knew she hated herself for it more than anything else, hated the loyalty that she could not shake for her first love, hated that she loved and loathed him with everything she could muster. She was broken in more ways than he could count.

This senseless game with the Polaroid had been Kyle's way of getting her to smile.

It sucked, but whatever. It kept Liz from crying, so he could withstand a few gay jokes, as long as Liz didn't start bawling her eyes out. Because crying chicks? They were a pain in the ass to deal with. But crying Parkers? He had to _feel_ that shit—_had _felt it—and there was no way he would willingly put himself through something like that again.

The cracks at his sexuality were hardly up to par with his verbal arsenal and he caught himself laughing a few times. Unexpected, but nice. An hour of lighthearted bickering and bantering found the three of them identically reclined, lying horizontally on Parker's mattress; their ankles crossed, their hands clasped behind their heads as they stared sightlessly at the bland ceiling. Michael laid to the right of Liz with Kyle on her left, none of them speaking except for the occasional barb or quiet murmur of "Remember when…?" The silence was thick, each of them lost in their own thoughts, but Michael found that he did not mind it so much. It was soothing in its own way, knowing he was not alone. Parker didn't seem like she was about to fly off the handle at any moment, so he declared his mission accomplished.

Michael wasn't sure why he didn't want to leave. He was exhausted, he had school and work to contend with, but he could not bring himself to get up and say goodbye. For that matter, he didn't know why Liz had yet to kick them out. Maybe she wanted to talk? She hadn't said anything for a while now, not anything of consequence. Even Kyle seemed contented with the simplicity of just existing in the moment.

It was peaceful. Michael never thought he would have ever attributed such a feeling with these two, least of all Elizabeth Parker.

He must have dozed off again at some point. He did not dream or remember falling asleep, but one moment he was lounging on Parker's bed, allowing her fluctuating emotions to roll over him like cool water and in the next, he was shaken awake. He jerked into a sitting position, startled, surveying the room for possible threats and found only Maria hovering over him, Max and Isabel standing awkwardly by the door. Beside him, Liz must have felt his momentary panic and mimicked him, gasping a little when her eyes flew open.

_'What's wrong? What happened? What's going on?'_

He cringed at the volume in Parker's tone, her frantic confusion pounding in his skull. _'Relax. It's just Maria.'_

He heard her sigh. _'You scared ten years off of my life, Michael.'_

_ 'That makes us even.'_

_ 'What?'_ She was staring at him. _'Never mind. I'm too tired to try and decipher Guerinese right now.'_

_'Shut up,_' he gruffed at her, though he admitted that she had a point: they were _all _too tired to deal with anything. Why were the others here, anyway? And where was Tess? What had happened in the UFO Center? Had someone taken care of Brody? What about Valenti? Michael did not see the former Sheriff going home without his son. Yawning, he realized that Maria was saying something but as he'd done so many times before, he let the words drift in one ear and out the other. After a moment, Maria moved to Liz, hugging her friend tightly. _'Wake Kyle up.'_

_ 'Can't. Maria. Squishing me.'_

He snorted aloud. Reaching behind the girls, he nudged Kyle a few times, who flew off of the bed to fall face-first onto the ground. Kyle executed a series of push-ups a second after impact and when he was finished, he plopped back onto the mattress as if there was nothing out of the ordinary, rubbing the slumber from his eyes. "What'd I miss?" was young Valenti's tired question, finally acknowledging the newcomers.

"We're having a meeting," answered Max, his arms crossed as he glared at Kyle.

Of course they were. Michael rolled his eyes.


	13. The Thirteenth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE THIRTEENTH**

"No, you're not."

Max gaped. "_Yes_, we _are_."

Parker tensed. The anger she tried so hard to hide beat against his skull; Michael wanted her to get her shit together because it was giving him a headache. "I'm exhausted," she reasoned, "we're _all_ exhausted. We can have a meeting some other time, preferably after some sleep."

He had to give her some credit. At least she retained a semblance of civility.

Max shook his head, obstinate. "No, we're having one _now_. We need to understand what, exactly, happened back there."

"I'd really rather wait for that conversation," Liz replied, still deceptively calm. "None of us understand what's going on at this point, so talking about it now isn't going to change that. In case you've forgotten, we have school in the morning and I haven't even studied for my English exam."

"We have exams?" Michael asked. His mind had been preoccupied.

The tension eased once her attention turned to Michael. "It's been on the bulletin board for weeks," she informed him dryly.

"Like I actually pay attention in that class."

"Liar. You identified two lines of a Robert Frost poem in seconds. I _know_ you pay attention."

He dismissed it with a wave. "Lucky guess." Robert Frost was hardly difficult to identify.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Ulysses," was all she said.

He narrowed his eyes right back. "Don't start your shit, Parker."

"You guys have the same class?" Maria chimed in, her eyes darting between them curiously. "I didn't know you were in Advanced English, Michael."

Liz nodded, silently conceding defeat. "I have to admit, I was a bit surprised myself, but he's actually pretty—"

"_Guys!_" Max interjected, his voice loud in the large room. "None of that's important right now. What we need to do is figure out how Brody got ahold of that device, and how Michael was able to transfer himself into Liz." Here, he lowered his volume. "Tess said something about a… a _kali_."

Michael could have slapped Max for bringing up Tess; the spark he'd defused had reignited at the mention of the little blonde's name, and Michael didn't think he could distract Liz a second time. What a wasted effort. "Where _is_ Tess?" asked Liz. The tone could be considered conversational to anyone who couldn't read her like an open book. "She seems to know more than any of us do, so why not bring _her_ to this meeting?"

"She was tired, so I told the Sheriff to take her home," said Max. "She used up a lot of energy on the mind warp."

This was not good.

"Gee, thanks," piped up Kyle, "now I get to _walk_ home."

Max's voice hardened. "She needed to rest, Kyle. I wasn't going to have her up for the rest of the night."

Liz was a ticking time bomb. "God forbid _Tess_ gets a little shaky on her feet. God forbid she has to stand here and listen to you after such a _tiresome, horrible_ ordeal she's gone through, _right_ Max? I mean, it's not like none of us were there, none of us had gotten shot, or, you know, _died_."

_'Whoa. Calm down,' _Michael sent at her. The vibrations he caught from her were distinctly off, entirely too familiar to that day by the bleachers.

She wasn't listening to him. "It makes perfect sense for you to send your little Queen home with Kyle's only ride without consulting anyone, _Your Royal Highness_, because _god for-fucking-bid you consult anyone before making a goddamned decision!_"

"Liz," Max tried.

"No, you're going to shut up and listen to _me _for a change, you bastard."

Was Michael the only one bothered by the uncharacteristic profanity? Why was she swearing so much? That, for some reason, bugged him more than anything else.

"_Liz_," Max tried again, but it was futile. Even Maria backed away from her best friend, alarmed.

Still, it was strangely gratifying that she wouldn't listen to Max, either.

"How dare you? How _dare_ you march in here and tell us that we have to sit through another one of your meetings when we're exhausted? We've _all _had a crazy day. Don't you even give a shit that your sister might need some comfort after you made her shoot a gun? I know it's difficult, but if you try _really _hard Max, I think you're perfectly capable of dislodging your head from your asslong enough to realize that none of us are in any shape for pandering to _His Excellency_. I am _not _one of your loyal subjects and I am _not_ in the mood for your bullshit."

A beat of thick, heavy silence followed her vulgar tirade.

Michael squashed down the vague sense of pride with a wave of disapproval. As entertaining as this was, he needed to get a handle on the situation before it spun out of control. He reached out to her with his mind and attempted a different approach. '_You're scaring Maria.' _

'_Maria hasn't given two shits about me or what I had to say before, so why should I give a fuck about what she thinks now?' _There was enough venom behind that mental reply that Michael winced, a black tendril of something horrible brushing up against his psyche as an afterthought. It was the same feeling he'd experienced when he'd encountered that disgusting tangle of writhing black tar hidden deep within her, the surface of which he'd barely skimmed. It made him shiver and brought with it the disturbing sensation of never feeling happy again; a part of him cringed away in revulsion while another hurried to soothe Parker with a wave of false calm.

_'Maria's your best friend, Parker.'_ He reminded. Christ, when had he agreed to play referee in the latest Parker-Evans Saga? This shit was getting old really fucking quickly and if he had to deal with one more outburst from her, he was going to punch someone. Probably Max, for provoking her. Or Kyle, for touching his nipple. _'The only one you're pissed at is Max. Don't take it out on everyone else.'_

_'I'm not taking it out on anyone.'_ The vitriol, he noted, had lessened significantly. She was still defensive. _'Max is just being unreasonable with his demands.'_

_ 'This is news to you?'_

The tension melted away, a spark of humor dancing around the edges of his senses. She didn't laugh or smile, but that oozing tendril of whatever-the-fuck was no longer present. Their mental back and forth had taken no longer than a hair's breadth of time and she probably seemed more than a little unstable, but he doubted she cared. Neither did he, for that matter. If she was happy, so was he; it meant not having to deal with a mental barrage of crap he shouldn't have had to deal with in the first place.

Of course, Michael wasn't a miracle worker. He couldn't fix everything and when Max retrieved his jaw from the floor, his words were bitter. "You seem to be the only one that has difficulty with _loyalty_, Liz."

Michael was going to punch the living shit out of Max.

Fuck nipples and midgets and incriminating Polaroids. Their alien king was going to pay for the explosion that went off in his head, his brain little more than crumpled and charred debris left in its wake. He groaned and rubbed at his temples, but the sensation of being ripped in two wouldn't go away. The throbbing, the aching, the _pulsing_ made him grit his teeth.

A lamp flickered off as it was yanked from the nightstand with unseen hands, flying past Michael's head to crash into the wall behind Max; had he not ducked in reflex, it would have smashed into his face.

Well, that was new.

"Get out."

Isabel jumped away from her brother with a look of surprise, uncomprehending, when the only other lamp in the room made a beeline for Maxwell Evans. Again, Max jumped out of the way. "What the—?" Another crash in the darkened room cut him off.

Michael stared dumbly at the shattered lamp.

"Get. Out."

He _really _hoped this wasn't what he thought it was.

"Liz?" With it being so dark, it was uncertain who had said her name.

"_Get out!_"

Shit.

When he and Kyle were bucked off of the bed, springs and all, Michael swore under his breath. An unnatural wind picked up and the room imploded, dressers toppling over, glass raining in from the broken windows. It was difficult to see with all of the light bulbs smashed, but the fluctuating power surged and roared, flickers of illumination that revealed a typhoon of mundane furniture turned into weapons with Parker standing at the vortex. Aside from her wild hair, she was motionless, wound tight while her dark eyes screamed bloody murder.

"What's happening?" Maria had to scream over the whirling wind.

A shit-storm, Maria. Michael ducked an oncoming slipper-shaped missile and grabbed his hysterical girlfriend.

"We have to get out of here!" It was Isabel, panicked.

He grabbed her, too. Michael had every intention of getting them the hell out of Parker's meltdown, but he doubted he'd be so lucky.

He shoved both young women, along with Kyle, out into the hall. One arm held high in defense, he grabbed a fistful of Max's collar and flung him as far out of harm's reach as he could, slamming the door closed behind them. He locked it for good measure, ignoring their shouts and roaring demands. As long as the others were safe, he could deal with the Parker problem unhindered and without a million questions to distract him. Never mind that they could blast through the door if they weren't so irrational. Never mind that he had no idea how to go about doing that, as the last time they'd dealt with a power malfunction had been his own, during an argument with Liz in the Crash Down. The night he'd seen her falling apart over Alex; the night he'd somehow opened this strange _thing_ with her and started this sojourn into the seriously fucked up.

This was bullshit. There wasn't another way to describe this entire night other than complete and utter _bullshit_.

It wasn't bad enough that Brody had gone off the deep end, again. It wasn't enough that Liz had been shot. _Again_. It wasn't enough that he'd unconsciously swapped bodies with her in order to keep her alive. It wasn't enough that she'd found out about Tess' pregnancy and she was even more off-kilter than she had been since Alex's death.

No, that had just been a goddamned appetizer.

While Hank was hardly an example he wanted to live by, Michael had the sudden urge to down a keg.

He still didn't understand why it had been Liz, of all people, he'd connected with. He didn't understand why it kept growing, _how _it kept growing, why it suddenly became his obligation to protect the irritating human. He didn't know why she was losing it like this, how it was possible that she was subconsciously using _their_ powers, or why she was steadily turning into an entirely different person. Worst of all, aside from her sporadic ventures into the insane, he had no idea why this connection didn't seem wrong to him. By all rights, it should have pissed him off, should have had him snarling to stay the fuck away from her.

But in the warzone that had once been Elizabeth Parker's room stood a girl even more broken than the furniture around her and, for some fucking reason, he _knew_ he had to fix it. Knew that he could.

It was the 'how' that was kicking his ass.

'_Liz,' _he tried, slowly treading towards her. He quickly dodged a twisted ball of metal and hopped closer. Had that been her lawn chair? _'Liz, damn it, snap the fuck out of it!'_

Nothing.

One of those weird tentacles brushed his skin, a tangible snarl of pure obsidian. He balked at the chilling caress, a quiver running down his spine at the icy touch. With a small mental push, the ugly thing leapt far away from him and retreated into the safe haven of Parker's closed mind. Desperate, his consciousness followed it, hoping to find some kind of access, an 'in', to rip her out of her shell, as he'd done before.

Something stopped him.

_The childe is lost_.

What? He jerked, the voice both familiar and not. He shook it off, reaching for Liz again with quiet words he doubted she heard. When he pushed again, trying to force his way in, a painful _snap_ pierced through something in his chest and he grunted, clutching at his collarbone.

_You cannot reach her. It would consume you, as it consumes her._

The only thing consuming him was the feeling of loss. It left him breathless. He struggled to understand who—or what—was talking to him. There were no creepy vibes, no wild emotions, no vague impressions, no _Liz_. The line had been cut, unplugged, and it manifested as a pain both physical and mental; he imagined that an amputated limb would feel much the same way. Horror dawned on him when he realized what had happened, what he'd lost, and anger roared to the surface as a reflex shortly thereafter, demanding retribution for having something he'd grown so used to suddenly taken away.

_Forgive me, dear one. It must be done._

He was reeling. Nothing made sense, least of all _that_.

But he'd be damned if he gave up so easily. He would _not_ lose anyone else; they'd already lost Alex and he would not let Liz go, too. He'd put a lot of time and effort into making sure that brilliant little pain-in-the-ass stayed in one piece, had gone against his 'royal' obligations as Max's Second to help her, had put aside differences to be the friend he'd never really been for her. He would be fucking _damned _if that all went to shit just because their fearless leader was on an asshole streak. So, slightly disoriented, he tried to use what mental feelers he had left to reach out with invisible fingers. They were weak and flickered dangerously, nearly giving out completely at one point, but they held true enough that he wrapped them around Parker and gave a gentle squeeze. With their link severed, even his telepathy was gone.

That did not mean he'd lost his voice. "_Liz!_"

Whether it was his emotions, his voice, or tattered remains of their link desperately trying to repair itself, he didn't know. Whatever it was, he saw her eyes widen in recognition, a soft murmur falling from her trembling lips. He couldn't hear it, but it might have been his name.

Relief flooded through him when the winds began to die down and some of the debris clattered to the floor.

Another point to Guerin.

He was ready to call it a night. Webs of pain shot down his spine, the steady throbbing in his chest weeping from what it had lost. He would deal with it tomorrow, after some much needed rest and a new shirt. Let everyone else deal with any more shenanigans that came up. He was _done_.

"_Michael!_"

Bone-tired, he didn't have the strength to dodge the wayward bureau.


	14. The Fourteenth

_Cry Your Name_

**THE FOURTEENTH**

Something was crawling around his head, gentle and not entirely unpleasant.

_'Michael, please. I'm so sorry. Please. Michael…'_

Soothing and sweet, like melted chocolate.

_'Michael. Michael, can you hear me? Oh, god, please, I'm so, so sorry. Open your eyes. Michael, open your eyes. Michael, Michael, Michael, MichaelMichaelMichaelMichaelMichaelMichael…'_

There was a sharp, desperate tug in the vicinity of his chest. It stung and he instinctively resisted, his mind guarding him from further injury. It tugged again, persistent and strong, and he could not stop it from attaching itself, building scabs around a fresh wound, placating him with smooth insistence. The sting became a low burn he could stand, though the intrusion annoyed him. It felt familiar, felt _right_, but he had not given it permission, so it had no business being there. Still, something clicked into place, made an even bigger niche for itself, and stole away any lingering pain.

He remembered this feeling. The time and place were lost on him, but he remembered it and it reassured him.

_A new bond must be forged. The old one will mend and fade, but the childe is stronger than I had believed. You will have to start again, learn again, but its pace and form will be your own._

"I can't… I can't bring him back."

"But you have to! He's not dead, I can still feel him! _He's not dead!_"

"I _know_ that, Liz, but… something's keeping him from waking up."

Someone, someplace, sobbed. It was a sorrowful mourning that echoed in his head, distraught and frantic.

_'Michael… please don't leave me. Don't you dare leave me, too.'_

"Can't you do that mind-speak thing you were telling me about?"

_ It will be stronger, dear one, than the last. She will make it so._

Who the hell were all of these people talking to him? It was giving him a headache.

"Mind-speak? What, like telepathy?"

"Yeah. Apparently, she and Chewbacca are one with the Force."

"Since when?"

"Hey, don't look at me like that, Evans. Yoda wasn't omniscient, either."

_But take heed, my son. The vessel will need your strength. You are ready, though you do not yet know, while she is lost._

"I've been trying, Kyle. He's not responding, he's not even grumbling at me! I don't know what to do, anymore. I can _feel_ him, but it's like he's blocking me and I can't get through it." Labored breathing. A whimper. "But… _god_, I didn't mean to hit him. The dresser just… I couldn't stop it in time… I just… _Isabel! _Isabel, dreamwalk him, maybe _you_ can find him, maybe you can bring him back—!"

"What do you mean, '_feel'_ him? Since when do you and Michael '_feel' _each other?"

"Now is _not _the time, Maria."

"You need to calm down."

"I don't need your permission to be hysterical, Max."

"Much as I hate to admit agreeing with _el jefe_, you're starting to freak me out."

"Starting? I'd like to know when the hell my best friend turned into Jean Gray and feeling my boyf—"

"Kyle, shut up. Max, back off. Maria, now is _not_ the time and _why isn't Isabel dreamwalking him, yet?!_"

"I would, if you people would shut up and let me concentrate!"

"Do you think—?"

"I'm not talking to you, Liz."

Silence. Wonderful, blessed silence. He gave an inner sigh of contentment at the peace, and then nearly threw a fit when not only could he feel someone trying to penetrate his orb, but the voices started up again. They were louder than before, full of panic and despair, and he wanted to cover his ears from the onslaught.

_ 'Michael, please.'_

_ There will come a time when you will need to choose._

_ 'Why won't you answer me? Michael, please, I don't care if you curse or tease me for my butt or… god, just open your eyes!'_

_ She has already chosen her Keeper._

_ 'Michael…'_

_ The bond is yours to make. Yours to keep._

_ 'Michael!'_

_ Yours to break._

His patience snapped. "Will you people _shut the fuck up_?" He groaned and rubbed his eyes, trying to ease the unhappy throbbing behind them. "_Christ._" The voices had become echoes, words just out of his reach, but before he could try and grab them, the air was knocked from his lungs when both Isabel and Maria hugged him as if they would never let go. With a face full of blonde hair and his head still pounding, he did his best to quell the urge to throw them off of him.

It took him a moment to get his bearings. He was on a bed, he realized, still shirtless. Probably Parker's bed. Once he'd hoisted himself into a seating position, his eyes instinctively looked for hers, taking in the ruined state of the furniture. He was silent as both Isabel and Maria fluttered over him, finally giving him some room to breathe. Even Max stopped being King Douche for all of twenty seconds to express his contentment. Kyle made some stupid joke he found amusing enough to smirk at and he replied in kind. Max gave Kyle a frosty glare but wisely chose to keep the hostility to a minimum; Isabel and Maria, two very different women for all of their similarities, didn't seem to mind that they were practically on top of each other, both doing their fair share of hovering. Like he was some damned baby they had to worry about.

But where was Liz?

He had to stop himself from blurting out the question. Annoyed, he brushed off every "What happened?" and "Are you okay?" until they backed off, similarly annoyed with his refusal to answer their inquiries. He understood their paranoia and knew why they fretted so, but it was Parker that needed the help, not him. It didn't seem right that they were all gathered in her destroyed bedroom—why hadn't anyone fixed it, yet?—without her. The only other place he could think of to look was on her balcony, but with two girls caging him from the front and two boys on either side, it was difficult to see anything except their magnified pores.

He needed more sleep. Too much had happened tonight, too many questions and too many near-death experiences. Hybrids didn't need as much sleep as humans did, they'd learned early on, but his head was swimming and his body was exhausted. He'd probably have to ditch both school and work in order to regain even a quarter of his stamina.

Still, he needed to see Liz. He needed to make sure she was all right.

Michael ignored whatever Maria was saying and reached out with his mind, something that was quickly becoming second nature to him. To his great relief, the invisible feelers were much more substantial than before, but nowhere near as sturdy as they'd been when he'd pulled his consciousness into Parker's body. His chest began to ache. He stared blankly at a wall, searching for the compelling flicker of emotions he'd become so attuned to.

It was harder than before, when he hadn't had to search at all to feel her. Stretching out as far as he could, he concentrated on the image of her in his mind; the scent of her hair, the soft gold of her skin, the distorted rainbow of her aura. Instinctively, he knew how to surf the airwaves and expanded his search past the borders of her room, his reach growing the longer he thought of her. It surprised him when he felt Max's brooding, muddy brown signature, Maria's flighty, bubbly pink, Isabel's icy blue, and Kyle's soothing emerald. He'd never seen theirs before. This inexplicable ability had been limited to Liz and himself, but now it had opened further, though it was dulled in its magnitude. He wondered if he could communicate with them as easily, if he could pick up impressions as he had with Liz.

As much as he wanted to experiment, his mind had been stressed past the breaking point. He needed rest and soon, but he needed to find Liz even more. Something screamed at him to find her, forced him to continue even when all he wanted to do was just pass out on her very comfortable mattress. After several minutes of his silence, pink exploded all over his inner vision and he jerked back into himself.

"Michael? Are you even listening?"

Maria. He rubbed a hand over his face, exasperated. "No," he answered truthfully, biting back a yawn.

"Figures."

He ignored her frustration in light of his own. "Where's Liz?"

Only Kyle deigned to answer, as the others looked like they'd swallowed a lemon. "Out on the fire escape. I think." While he seemed a little awkward, Valenti obviously held no malice against Liz. It was so stupid watching the others act this way, treating her like a parasite. He would have said something, told them to knock off the kiddy shit, before he remembered that not too long ago, he'd done the same damned thing.

He moved to get off of the bed, ready to push past the somewhat human wall to go see Parker for himself, when an unseen force knocked him back on the mattress.

_The childe cannot be reached. _

Maria was wailing, wondering why he'd fallen back so suddenly. Exclamations arose like wildfire, but all he heard was that voice. He ignored them, concentrating on the strange energy that kept him in place, hovering around the edges of his consciousness. Michael frowned, his vision growing dark around the edges. _'Who the hell are you?' _

_Who I am is of no consequence. _

"You think he has a concussion?"

"I healed him, Is. Physically, he's fine."

"Maybe he's just tired." Was that Kyle?

"Maybe. It's been a long night." Max. Definitely Max. "I'm so stupid. I should've listened to Liz. None of us were in any shape to deal with this."

"Yeah, you _should've_ listened to Liz."

"That's not fair, Maria. How was Max supposed to know she'd lose it like that? She's not supposed to have powers."

"Look, I get you're defending your brother and all, but Liz _told_ him she wasn't in the mood. He didn't listen, like always, and look what happened. I don't care if Liz has powers or not, she's the smartest, most rational person I've ever known. Like, I wouldn't have survived school without her. I wouldn't have survived _puberty_ without her. So don't go blaming this on Liz."

"That's very noble, especially when you were yelling at her for feeling your boyfriend not that long ago."

"Oh, _please_. Just 'cause I was jealous doesn't mean I'm not on Liz's side. She's like, my best friend and I'll bet she has a perfectly good explanation for everything."

"What, like her brilliant theory that aliens killed Alex?"

"Don't you _dare _bring Alex into this. We loved Alex more than anything and if Liz said—"

"I loved him just—!"

"Okay, that's enough, ladies. We're not getting anywhere with you two yelling at each other." Kyle, the voice of reason.

Michael cursed inside. Their bickering made him edgier. _'Where's Liz?' _he demanded.

_Rest, dear one, and do not fret._

His eyes were already closing.

"Let me call my dad. The big guy can crash at my place for a while," Kyle said. "I don't think we can explain him sleeping here."

"I'll let Mister Parker know he can't make it in tomorrow," said Maria.

"Sounds good. Can you guys get his notes? I only have Geometry with him." Kyle, again.

"I can ask his teachers."

"Thanks, Is."

Michael slipped into slumber, still worried, still annoyed, and still wondering where Parker was.


End file.
